Srom  f^e  feifirari?  of 

(J)rofe66or  ^amuef  (gXiffer 

xxK  (jytemoti?  of 

3wi>ge  ^amuef  (gliffer  QBrecftinrtbge 

(presented  6l? 

^amuef  (ttltffer  QBrecfttnribge  feong 

to  t^e  feifirari?  of 

(Princeton  C^eofogtcaf  ^eminarj 


BV  665  .B6 

Boardman,  Henry  A.  1808 

^^®^*  T-tical  doctrine  o£ 


y-^-<^/ 


THE 


PEELATICAL  DOCTRINE 


APOSTOLIC.IL  SUCCESSION  EXAMINED: 


WITH   A   DELINEATION 


HIGH-CHUECH  SYSTEM. 


By  H.  a.  BOARDMAN, 

PASTOR    OF   THE   TEXni   PRESCYTEniAN    CHURCH,    PHILAEELPHIA. 


PHILADELPHIA: 

PUBLISHED  BY  WILLIAM  S.  MARTIEN. 

New  York  :  Robert  Carter. — Boston  :  Crocker  &  Brewster. 

Pittsburgh  :  Thomas  Carter. 

IS44. 


^   '     ..>J.> 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress  in  the  year  1844,  by  William 
S.  Martien,  in  the  Office  of  the  Clerk  of  the  District  Court  of  the 
Eastern  District  of  Pennsylvania. 


CONTENTS 


P.VGE 

Preface,    5 


CHAPTER  I. 
Higii-Church  Pretensions, 13 

CHAPTER  II. 
Statement  of  the  Question, 29 

CHAPTER  III. 
The  Argument  from  Scripture,   35 

CHAPTER  IV. 
TiiE  Historical  Argument, 99 

CHAPTER  V. 

The  Succession  tested  by  facts,    170 

CHAPTER  VI. 
The  True  Succession, 182 

CHAPTER  VII. 

Characteristics  and  Tendencies   op   the   High-Church   Sys- 
tem : — The  Rule  of  Faith, 224 


4  CONTENTS. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

r.voE 
The  Church  put  in  Christ's  place,  249 


CHAPTER  IX. 

The  System  at  variance  with  the  general  tone  of  the  New 
Testament, 263 


CHAPTER  X. 

Tendency  of  the  System  to  aggrandize  the  Prelatical 
Clergy  : — and  to  substitute  a  ritual  religion  for  true 
Christianity, 273 

CHAPTER  XI. 
Intolerance  of  the  System, 292 

CHAPTER  XII. 
The  Sciiismatical  tendency  of  the  System, 321 

CHAPTER  XIII. 

Aspect  of  the  System  towards  Inquiring  Sinners, — Conclu- 
sion,    334 


PREFACE 


I  MAKE  no  apology  for  writing  a  book  on  the 
Prelatical  controversy.  Matters  have  reached 
such  a  pass  that  Non-EpiscopaUans  must  either 
defend  themselves,  or  submit  to  be  extruded 
from  the  house  of  God.  The  High-Church 
party  have  come  into  the  Church  of  Christ, 
where  we  and  our  fathers  have  been  for  ages, 
and  gravely  undertaken  to  partition  it  off  among 
themselves  and  the  corrupt  Romish  and  Ori- 
ental Hierarchies.  They  say  to  us,  and  by  us 
I  mean^  thirteen  out  of  fourteen  of  all  the  evan- 
gelical ministers,  and  thirty-three  out  of  thirty- 
four  of  all  the  evangelical  Christians,  of  this 
country — "You  are  no  ministers,  but  schismati- 
cal  intruders  into  the  sacred  office — You  have 

'  See  page  312. 
1* 


6  PREFACE. 

no  ordinances,  no  part  in  the  promises,  no  cove- 
nanted title  to  eternal  life — You  are  out  of  the 
Church,  mere  '  sectaries'  and  '  dissenters,'  and 
if  you  are  saved  at  all,  it  must  be  through  '  un- 
co venanted  mercy.'  "  They  must  count  upon 
our  having  at  least  one  Christian  grace  in  per- 
fection, whether  we  are  in  the  Church  or  out 
of  it,  if  they  expect  us  to  bear  all  this  in  silence. 
But  we  are  not  at  liberty  to  be  silent.  If  it 
were  a  mere  personal  matter,  we  could  put 
up  with  abuse  from  this  quarter  as  well  as 
from  any  other.  But  this  is  the  least  import- 
ant aspect  of  the  movement.  We  regard  it 
as  a  systematic  and  violent  attack  upon  "the 
faith  once  delivered  to  the  saints" — as  a  daring 
attempt  to  seize  upon  "  the  crown  rights  of 
THE  REDEEMER,"  and  entail  them  upon  the 
Bishops.  We  look  upon  it  as  an  organized 
scheme  for  establishing  an  exclusive  and 
LORDLY  hierarchy  in  this  country.  We  be- 
lieve the  whole  tendency  of  the  system  is  to 
substitute  a  mere  ritual  religion  for  true 
Christianity.  We  feel  called  upon,  there- 
fore, by  every  consideration  of  patriotism,  of 
fealty  to  the  Great  Head  of  the  Church,  and  of 
fidelity  to  the  spiritual  interests  of  those  around 


PREFACE. 


US,  to  bring  the  pretensions  of  this  party  to  the 
test  of  Scripture  and  History. 

These  remarks  will  explain  the  design  of 
the  present  volume — the  substance  of  which 
has  been  laid  before  my  own  congregation,  in 
a  course  of  Lectures.  The  standard  works 
of  the  Rev.  Drs.  Miller  and  Mason,  have  long 
been  before  the  public,  and  are  not  likely,  on 
the  main  question  between  Prelatists  and  their 
opposers,  to  be  superseded  by  any  future  pub- 
lications. To  the  writings  of  these  eminent 
divines,  the  author  has  been  largely  indebted — 
especially  in  conducting  the  first  branch  of 
the  argument.  I  have  also  consulted  freely 
the  works  of  the  Rev.  Dr.  Smyth  of  Charles- 
ton, S.  C,  whose  learned  and  elaborate  volumes 
on  the  "Apostolical  Succession,"  and  ''Pres- 
bytery and  Prelacy,"  with  his  numerous  smaller 
treatises  on  kindred  subjects,  entitle  him  to 
the  cordial  gratitude  of  the  Non-Prelatical 
Churches.  My  object  has  been  to  do  some- 
thing towards  supplying  a  deficiency  which 
appeared  to  me  not  to  have  been  fully  met 
by  any  of  the  able  and  valuable  w^orks  I  have 
named,  nor,  indeed,  by  any  other  which  has 
as  yet  fallen  under  my  observation.     I  have 


8  PREFACE. 

felt  the  want,  and  the  inquiries  put  to  me  as 
a  Pastor,  have  convinced  me  that  it  v^as  felt 
by  others,  of  a  worh  comj^rising  within  a  single 
portable  volume,  a  concise  discussion  of  the  lead- 
ing points  at  issue  between  High- Churchmen  and 
ourselves,  and  adapted  to  the  present  stage  of  the 
controversy.  I  cannot  flatter  myself  that  I  have 
succeeded  in  producing  the  v^ork  that  is  needed 
to  fill  this  hiatus.  But  flooded  as  the  country 
is  with  High-Church  publications,  of  all  grades 
and  dimensions,  I  trust  the  present  volume  may 
answer  a  useful  purpose  ybr  the  time,  until  some 
one  more  competent  and  with  more  leisure,  shall 
furnish  a  work  better  adapted  to  meet  the  exist- 
ing deficiency. 

As  to  the  plan  of  this  work,  it  will  be  seen 
by  a  glance  at  the  table  of  contents,  that  it 
comprises  two  parts,  the  first  of  which  treats 
of  ''the  Apostolical  Succession;"  and  the 
second,  of  "■  the  characteristics  and  tenden- 
cies OF  the  High-Church  system."  I  set  out 
with  the  intention  of  discussing  the  former  of 
these  topics  only ;  but  I  found  it  impracticable 
to  do  justice  to  that  subject,  without  sketching 
the  other  features  of  the  system  to  which  it 
belongs.     They  mutually  illustrate  each  other. 


PREFACE. 


I  have  aimed  throughout,  not  at  novelty,  hut 
utihty.  My  book  is  for  the  people.  Famihar 
as  the  scriptural  argument  against  Prelacy  is 
to  the  learned,  there  are  many  intelligent  lay* 
men  who  have  nes^lected  to  make  themselves 
acquainted  with  it.  In  so  far  as  I  have  gone 
into  that  argument,  I  have  presented  it  in  the 
usual  form,  —  not  caring  to  affect  an  air  of 
originality  where  originality  was  out  of  the 
question,  nor  solicitous  to  strengthen  by  new 
authorities,  a  position  which,  though  often  as- 
sailed, has  thus  far  proved  impregnable.  The 
other  sources  of  argument  are  still  less  familiar 
to  the  general  reader ;  but  these  also  have  been 
so  well  explored  of  late,  that  the  chief  labour 
an  author  has  to  perform,  consists  in  the  mere 
selection  and  arrangement  of  materials. 

It  may,  perhaps,  be  objected  to  the  work, 
in  certain  quarters,  that  it  confounds  High- 
Church-ism  with  Puseyism.  I  am  aware  that 
while  all  Puseyites  are  High-Churchmen,  all 
High-Churchmen  are  not  Puseyites.  I  would 
not  impute  to  individuals  sentiments  they  do 
not  hold.  I  am  dealing,  however,  with  the 
High-Church  system.  No  one,  I  presume, 
will  deny  that  this  system  and  the  system  of 


10  PREFACE. 

the  Oxford  Tracts,  are  identical  in  all  their 
essential  features.  It  was  the  publication  of 
those  Tracts,  which  revived  the  torpid  High- 
Chnrch-ism  of  the  Episcopal  clergy.  They 
are  read,  quoted,  recommended,  as  the  best 
exposition  of  the  system  extant.  They  are  the 
armory  from  which  its  champions  have  furnish- 
ed themselves  for  their  present  attack  upon  the 
Non-Prelatical  Churches.  To  allege,  there- 
fore, that  there  are  High-Churchmen  who  reject 
a  part  of  the  mummeries  and  a  part  of  the 
Popery  of  some  of  the  Oxford  writers,  while  it 
releases  them  as  individuals  from  the  responsi- 
bility of  those  tenets  which  they  disclaim,  does 
not  touch  the  fact  that  the  High-Church  and 
Tractarian  systems  are  substantially  one.  In- 
deed, the  very  circumstance  here  urged  in 
abatement  of  the  condemnation  pronounced 
upon  the  High-Church  system,  to  wit,  that  cer- 
tain of  the  leading  expounders  of  it  have  well- 
nigh  become  Papists,  furnishes  a  legitimate 
ground  of  argument  against  the  system,  as  dis- 
closing its  strong  afiinity  for  Popery. 

As  to  the  tone  of  this  book,  I  have  only  to 
say,  that  I  have  endeavoured  to  treat  the  party 
whose  views  I  have  controverted,  with  candour, 


PREFACE.  11 

and  shall  deeply  regret  it  if  I  have,  in  any  in- 
stance, done  them  injustice.  I  have,  however, 
felt  it  due  to  all  concerned,  "  to  call  things  by 
their  right  names." 

I  commit  the  work  to  the  press,  praying  that 
it  may  please  God  to  use  it  as  an  humble  in- 
strument in  checking  the  progress  of  error  and 
formalism,  and  promoting  the  cause  of  truth  and 
righteousness. 

Philadelphia,  April,  1844. 


THE 


HIGH-CHURCH  DOCTHINE 


OF    THE 


APOSTOLICAL   SUCCESSION. 


CHAPTER  I. 

HIGH-CHURCH    PRETENSIONS. 

The  controversy  which  now  agitates  the  Church  of 
England,  and.  its  daughter  in  this  country,  has  a  two- 
fold aspect, — one  internal,  the  other  external ;  or  a 
domestic  and  a  foreign  aspect.  Viewed  in  its  domes- 
tic relations  merely.  Christian  courtesy  would  forbid 
other  churches  to  interfere  in  it.  But  regarded  in  its 
more  general  characteristics  and  tendencies,  it  is  not 
only  their  right,  but  has  become  their  imperative  duty 
to  notice  it. 

Owing  to  causes  which  need  not  now  be  specified, 
there  has  always  been — as  candid  and  inteUigent 
Episcopalians  have  admitted — a  party  in  the  Church 
of  England,  whose  doctrinal  sentiments  and  personal 
sympathies,  have  had  a  marked  bias  towards  the 
Church  of  Rome,  associated  with  a  corresponding 
hostility  to  Protestantism.     This  party,  after  placing 

2 


14  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

themselves  at  the  head  of  the  late  Oxford -Tract 
movement,  avowed  it,  in  so  many  words,  as  their  ob- 
ject, to  "  Unprotestanize  the  National  Church." 
"  We  cannot,"  is  their  language,  "  stand  where  we 
are ;  we  must  go  backwards  or  forwards ;  and  it  will 
surely  be  the  latter.  And  as  we  go  on,  ive  must  re- 
cede mo7^e  and  more  from  the  principles^  ^f  any  such 
there  he,  of  the  English  Reformat ion.^^^  This  pre- 
diction, or  purpose,  has  been  faithfully  carried  out. 
The  Puseyite  party,  on  both  sides  the  Atlantic,  has 
gone  on  assimilating  itself  to  the  Church  of  Rome, 
until  at  length  there  seem  to  be  only  a  ic\Y  impedi- 
ments, and  these  mostly  circumstantials  rather  than 
essentials,  to  a  formal  union  between  them. 

It  has  been  part  and  parcel  of  this  movement,  from 
the  beginning,  to  disparage  all  unprelatical  churches, 
or  rather  to  deny  their  very  existence  as  churches. 
The  doctrine  of  its  authors  and  abettors,  is,  ?2o  (Dioce- 
san) Bishop,  no  Church.  No  matter  though  a  Chris- 
tian denomination  may  hold,  in  simplicity  and  purity, 
the  distinctive  doctrines  of  the  Bible,  and  abound  in 
those  fruits  of  holiness  which  inspired  men  have  made 
the  sure  evidence  of  a  genuine  faith  and  of  the  pres- 
ence of  the  Spirit ;  if  they  are  without  prelates  de- 
scended in  an  unbroken  line  from  the  Apostles,  they 
have  only  the  outward  semblance  of  real  Christianity; 
they  are  no  part  of  the  Church  of  Christ.  The  mere 
possession  of  prelacy,  on  the  other  hand,  is  held  to 
countervail  the  grossest  corruptions  of  faith  and  prac- 
tice, in  so  far,  at  least,  that  the  body  thus  distinguished 
is  to  be  recognised  as  a  genuine  branch  of  the  church. 

This  doctrine,  so  repugnant  to  Scripture  and  rea- 
son, and  so  revolting  to  every  sentiment  of  humble 

1  British  Critic,  for  July,  1811,  pp.  44,  5. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  15 

piety,  has  not  been  thrown  out  in  mere  hints  and  im- 
plications; nor  is  it  now  confined  to  the  ultra-Puseyites 
of  Great  Britain,  and  a  few  vain  and  noisy  individ- 
uals inoculated  with  the  semi-popery  virus  in  this 
country.  It  is  the  doctrine  of  the  school — openly 
avowed,  and  zealously  disseminated  by  the  pulpit 
and  the  press.  That  there  are  multitudes  in  the 
Episcopal  Church  who  detest  the  doctrine  and  the 
whole  system  of  which  it  is  a  part,  is  shown  by  the 
state  of  that  Church  at  the  present  time.  What  pro- 
portion these  may  constitute,  of  that  communion,  it  is 
neither  practicable  nor  important  to  determine.  It  is 
undeniable  that  the  system  in  question  has  the  appro- 
bation of  many  of  their  bishops,  and  a  large  number  of 
the  inferior  clergy,  including  some  who  two  or  three 
years  ago,  were  regarded  as  Evangelical  Low  Church- 
men. The  writings  of  the  sect  find  a  large  and  ready 
sale  here.  A  "\;^ry  influential  portion  of  the  Episcopal 
periodical  press,  is  devoted  to  the  propagation  of  their 
principles.  And,  not  content  with  public  and  official 
agencies  for  disseminating  their  views,  a  meddlesome, 
proselyting  spirit  has  diffused  itself  among  the  laity. 
The  courtesies  of  social  intercourse  are  pressed  into 
the  service  of  "  the  church,"  and  private  homilies  on 
the  Apostolical  Succession,  the  divine  right  of  Bishops, 
and  the  nullity  of  Presbyterian  Sacraments,  are  de- 
livered from  house  to  house  by  fluent  lecturers  and 
lecturesses,  the  sum  of  whose  theological  reading 
amounts,  perhaps,  to  three  or  four  polemical  tracts ! 

The  Protestant  Churches  can  ill  afford  at  the  pre- 
sent juncture  to  fall  out  among  themselves;  and  a 
controversy  whh  this  party  cannot,  in  the  nature  of 
things,  be  carried  on,  without  producing  some  inci- 
dental evils.     But  the  responsibility  of  it  belongs  ex- 


16  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

clusively  to  those  who  have  commenced  the  warfare. 
On  the  part  of  non-Episcopahans,  it  is  a  work  of 
SELF-DEFENCE.  The  alternative  is  forced  upon  us, 
either  to  vindicate  our  poUty  against  the  repeated  and 
furious  assaults  of  Piiseyites  and  High-Churchmen, 
or  to  leave  our  people  exposed  to  the  insidious  in- 
fluences of  a  system  which  would  substitute  a  foun- 
dation of  sand  for  the  rock,  Christ  Jesus. — How  foreign 
a  controversy  respecting  points  of  ecclesiastical  order 
is  from  the  ordinary  tastes  and  habits  of  our  ministry, 
must  be  known  to  every  enlightened  Presbyterian. 
We  are  trained  from  infancy  to  regard  points  of  this 
kind  as  of  very  subordinate  importance.  The  truth 
we  are  jealous  of.  Believing  as  we  do  that  no  Church 
can  enjoy  permanent  spiritual  prosperity,  which  toler- 
ates grave  theological  errors,  we  are  more  rigid  than 
most  of  the  Churches  around  us,  in  insisting  upon  sub- 
stantial uniformity  of  doctrine  among^our  ministers. 
But  questions  of  form  and  organization,  are  seldom 
discussed  in  our  pulpits.  It  is  a  rare  thing— too  rare, 
indeed — to  hear  a  Presbyterian  pastor  preach  on  the 
disthictive  features  of  our  own  polity;  still  rarer,  to 
find  one  bringing  the  polity  of  a  sister-church  to  the 
test  of  Scripture.  J>^evertheless,  we  have  our  polity, 
and  in  its  place  and  for  its  appropriate  ends,  as  a 
framework  and  scaffolding  for  the  spiritual,  uses  and 
functions  of  the  Church,  we  set  a  high  value  upon  it. 
We  believe  that  it  is  more  nearly  conformed  to  the 
primitive  model  than  any  other.  And  we  should  be 
faithless  to  our  Master,  if  we  were  not  prepared  to 
defend  it  when  it  is  assailed. 

The  assault  we  have  now  to  repel,  is  not,  it  is  true, 
directed  against  our  own  Church  alone.  It  is  a  war- 
fare waged  against  all  Churches  which  hold  to  the 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  17 

parity  of  the  ministry.  The  party  engaged  in  it — 
confessedly  large,  weahhy,  and  inflnential  —  have 
come  forward  in  the  face  of  the  world,  and  challenged 
for  their  own  and  other  Prelatical  Churches,  a  mono- 
poly of  all  the  rights,  privileges,  and  endowments  of 
the  Church  of  Christ.  With  a  sacrilegious  hand  they 
would  sever  the  cords  which  have  hitherto  bound  the 
Episcopal  Church  to  the  sisterhood  of  the  Reformed 
Churches,  and  link  her  in  interest  and  in  destiny  to 
the  corrupt  Romish  and  Oriental  Churches.  They 
style  their  Church  in  this  country,  in  official  docu- 
ments, "The  Church  op  the  United  States;"* 
and  with  an  insolence  equalled  only  by  its  fatuity, 
they  designate  non-Episcopalians  by  the  epithet  of 
dissenters.  They  claim  to  be  the  only  Church  in  the 
Union,  except  the  Roman  Catholic,  their  '^  Roman 
Sister,"  as  they  are  fond  of  calling  her.  They  affirm 
that  all  other  societies  claiming  to  be  Churches,  are 
"schismatical  organizations" — that  our  ministers  are 
"  self-appointed  teachers,"  without  authority  to  preach 
or  to  administer  the  sacraments — that  our  ordinances 

'  The  "Church  Almanac,"  for  the  year  1843,  contains  a  list  of 
the  Episcopal  Bishops  and  Clergy,  under  the  head  of  "  Dioceses  op 
THE  Church  of  the  United  States."  The  Hon.  Judge  Jay,  himself 
an  Episcopalian,  in  his  recent  letter,  rebukes  the  arrogance  and 
absurdity  of  this  title,  in  terms  of  just  severity.  "You  will  with  me 
(he  says)  thank  God  that  there  is  no  Church  of  the  United  States,  and 
that  there  can  be  none  so  long  as  the  Federal  Constitution  is  in  force. 
The  fanatics  assembled  in  the  city  of  Nauvoo  have  as  much  right  to 
assume  this  arrogant  title  as  we  have. 

"And  by  what  authority  is  this  false  and  impudent  title  substituted 
for  our  constitutional  name,  the  *  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in  the 
United  States  of  America?'  The  Almanac  professes  to  be  published 
by  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Tract  Society.  And  who  is  the  Pre- 
sident of  tliis  society  ?  Tiie  gentleman  who  ordained  Mr.  Carey." 

(Seethe  whole  UUer.in  the  Presbyterian  of  December  2d,  1843.) 
2^ 


18  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

are  invalid — that  it  is  "  unlawful  to  attend  our  minis- 
try," and  that  to  hear  us,  is  "rebellion  against  God." 
You  shall  judge  for  yourselves  whether  this  picture 
is  overdrawn. 

Dr.  Hook,  the  Vicar  of  Leeds,  in  his  sermon  entitled, 
"  Hear  the  Church,"  says  of  this  country,  "  there  you 
may  see  the  Church,  like  an  oasis  in  the  c/e^er/,  blessed 
by  the  dews  of  heaven,  and  shedding  heavenly  bless- 
ings around  her  in  a  land  where,  because  no  religion 
is  established,  if  it  were  not  for  her,  nothing  hxd  the 
extremes  of  infidelity  or  fanaticism  would  prevail." 
If  the  sermon  containing  this  sentence  had  not  been 
republished  here  with  the  endorsement  of  one  of  the 
Bishops  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church,  it  would 
not  be  worth  noticing.  As  it  is,  it  must  strike  every 
sensible  American  (Pnseyites  always  excepted,)  as  a 
very  ludicrous  statement,  that  if  it  were  not  for  the 
Episcopal  Church,  the  smallest  of  the  four  leading 
denominations,  there  would  be  nothing  here  but  "  the 
extremes  of  infidelity  or  fanaticism." 

We  have  Dr.  Hook's  figure  repeated  by  Bishop 
Brownell,  of  Connecticut,  in  his  late  charge: — "The 
Protestant  Episcopal  Church  in  this  country  appears 
as  ^an  oasis  in  the  desert.'  "   (p.  9.) 

"  It  is  not,"  say  the  Oxford  Tracts,  "  merely  that 
Episcopacy  is  a  better  or  more  scriptural  form  than 
Presbyterianism,  (true  as  this  may  be  in  its-elf)  that 
Episcopalians  are  right,  and  Presbyterians  are  wrong, 
but  because  the  Presbyterian  ministers  have  assnined 
it  poioer  mhich  teas  nexer  entrusted  to  them.  This  is 
a  standing  condemnation  from  which  they  cannot 
escape,  except  by  artifices  of  argument  which  will 
seVve  equally  to  protect  the  self-authorized  teachers 
ofrehgion." — (Tract  No.  l.p.  2.) 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  19 

Again:  "So  far  from  its  being  a  strange  thing  that 
Protestant  sects  are  not  '  in  Christ'  in  the  same  ful- 
ness that  ive  are,  it  is  more  accordant  to  the  scheme 
of  the  world  that  they  should,  lie  between  us  and 
heathenism.''^    (  Tract  No.  47.) 

High-Churchmen  in  the  United  States  are  no  longer 
timid  about  maintaining  that  there  is  no  Church  in 
this  country  except  the  Roman  Catholic  and  their  own. 
While  these  sheets  are  passing  through  the  press,  the 
Rev.  Dr.  Wainwright  of  New  York  is  publishing  in 
the  newspapers  a  series  of  elaborate  articles  in  vindi- 
cation of  the  sentiment  uttered  by  him  at  the  late 
dinner  of  the  "New  England  Society ,'Mhat  "/Aere 
cannot  be  a  Church  ivithout  a  Bishop.^^ 

"  I  have  lived,"  says  Bishop  Doane  of  New  Jersey, 
"  in  a  land  peopled  by  those  who  emigrated  from  this 
country.  It  is  the  fashion  to  call  some  of  them  the 
Pilgrim  Fathers — men  who  fancied  themselves  some- 
Avhat  straitened  in  the  enjoyment  of  religious  liberty — 
who,  in  the  claim  of  greater  freedom  in  God's  worship 
and  service,  set  out  for  distant  shores,  and  planted 
themselves  in  a  region  now  called  New  England.  I 
enter  not  into  the  inquiry  as  to  the  character  of  these 
men,  the  justice  of  their  complaints,  or  the  motives 
for  their  proceedings.  1  will  accord  to  them  all  that 
charity  can  ask.  They  went  from  here,  as  they 
thought,  and  truly  believed,  the  true  followers  of  the 
Gospel  of  Jesus  Christ;  preaching,  as  they  thought, 
the  very  principles  of  the  Reformation;  but  without 
a  Church — without  a  liturgy — with  no  transmitted 
authority  from  God  to  minister  in  holy  things.^' 
(From  a  speech  made  in  St.  Mary's  Hall,  Coventry, 
England.) 

The  same  prelate,  in  his  sermon  entitled, "  The  Office 


20  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

of  a  Bishop,"  says:  "Yes,  could  I  swell  my  voice 
till  it  should  reach  from  Canada  to  Mexico,  and  from 
the  Atlantic  to  the  Pacific  shore,  it  should  be  lifted  up 
to  entreat  all  who  heard  it,  not  to  be  content  with  the 
word  of  God  without  that  ministry  and  those  sacra- 
ments, which  are  equally  his  ordinances,  and  equally 
essential  to  salvation.^^   (p.  26.) 

Again:  "The  seeming  harshness  of  the  inference, 
the  conclusion  that  the  loss  of  salvation  must  follow 
the  failure  in  any  of  these  essentials,  may  be  safely 
left  to  the  depth  of  the  riches  of  grace." — [Bishop 
Doane:   Office  of  Bishop,  p.  2S.) 

"  The  attempt,  (says  Mr.  Froude,)  to  substitute  any 
other  form  of  ordination  for  it,  (Episcopal  ordination,) 
or  to  seek  communion  with  Christ  through  any  non- 
Episcopal  association,  is  to  be  regarded  not  as  a 
schism,  but  as  an  impossibility.^^  (Froude'' s  Re- 
mains, iii.  43.) 

"A  person  not  commissioned  from  the  bishop, 
may  use  the  words  of  baptism,  and  sprinkle  or  bathe 
with  water  on  earth,  but  there  is  no  promise  from 
Christ,  that  such  a  man  shall  admit  souls  into  the 
kingdom  of  heaven.  A  person  not  commissioned, 
may  break  bread,  pour  out  wine,  and  proceed  to 
give  the  Lord's  Supper,  but  it  can  aftbrd  no  com- 
fort to  any  to  receive  it  at  his  hands,  because  there  is 
no  warrant  from  Christ  to  lead  communicants  to  sup- 
pose that  while  he  does  so  here  on  earth,  they  will  be 
partakers  of  the  Saviour's  heavenly  body  and  blood. 
And  as  to  the  person  himself^  who  takes  upon  him- 
self without  warrant,  [that  is,  without  having  had  the 
hands  of  a  Diocesan  Bishop  laid  upon  his  head,]  to 
minister  in  holy  things,  he  is  all  the  while  treading 
in  the  steps  of  Korah,  Dathan,  and  Jlbiram,  whose 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  21 

awful  punishment  we  read  of  in  the  book  of  Num- 
bers."   {Tract  No.  35.) 

Tlie  following  passage  is  given  in  the  Oxford 
Tracts  from  Dodweli,  and  copied  into  one  of  their 
organs  in  this  country. 

"  None  but  the  Bishops  can  unite  us  to  the  Father 
and  the  Son.  Whence  it  will  follow,  that  whosoever 
is  disunited  from  the  visible  communion  of  the  Church 
on  earth,  and  particularly  from  the  visible  com- 
munion of  the  Bishops,  must  consequently  be  dis- 
united from  the  whole  visible  Catholic  Church  on 
earth ;  and  not  only  so,  but  from  the  invisible  com- 
munion of  the  holy  angels  and  saints  in  heaven,  and, 
what  is  yet  more,  from  Chi^ist  and  God  himself.  It 
is  one  of  the  most  dreadful  aggravations  of  the  con- 
dition of  the  damned,  that  they  are  banished  from  the 
presence  of  the  Lord,  and  the  glory  of  his  power.  The 
SAME  is  their  condition  also  who  are  disunited  from 
Christ,  by  being  disunited  from  his  visible  repre- 


sentative: 


t" 


Seldom  has  a  poor  worm  of  the  dust  gone  further 
in  challenging  to  himself  the  prerogatives  of  Jehovah, 
than  this  writer  has  in  thus  dealing  out  damnation  to 
all  of  every  character  and  condition  who  happen  not 
to  belong  to  a  prelatical  sect.  The  late  Episcopal 
Bishop  of  one  of  the  neighbouring  dioceses  was  not, 
however,  far  behind  him. 

"  But  where  the  Gospel  is  proclaimed  (he  says  in 
one  of  his  works,')  communion  with  the  Church,  by 
the  participation  of  its  ordinances,  at  the  hands  of  the 
duly  authorized  priesthood,  is  the  indispensable  condi- 
tion of  salvation.^^     He  afterwards  makes  an  excep- 

'  See  Bishop  Hobart's  "  Companion  for  the  Altar." 


22  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

tioii  in  favour  of  those  who  separate  themselves  from 
the  regular  priesthood  through  "  involuntary  ignorance 
or  error,"  provided  they  be"  humble,  penitentjand  obe- 
dient." But  every  one  can  judge  how  far  this  should 
be  regarded  as  modifying  the  offensive  statement. 

The  present  Bishop  of  the  same  diocese  has  in- 
herited his  predecessor's  principles,  and  is  equally 
explicit  in  avowing  them. 

"None  but  the  bishops  (is  his  language)  can  unite 
ns  to  the  Father,  in  the  way  of  Christ's  appointment, 
and  these  bishops  must  be  such  as  receive  their  mis- 
sion from  the  first  commissioned  Apostles." 

This  Bishop  has  softened  his  arrogant  claim  of  ex- 
clusive salvation  for  prelatical  churches,  by  throwing 
in  a  qualifying  clause:  "None  but  the  bishops  can 
unite  us  to  the  Father,  i?i  the  way  of  Christ'^ s  appoint- 
menty  Other  High-Church  writers  in  this  country 
have  usually  done  the  same  thing.  Shrinking  from 
the  direct  affirmation  that  all  non-Episcopalians  will 
certainly  be  damned,  and  aware  that  in  a  country 
where  people  think  for  themselves,  such  a  senti- 
ment would  recoil  upon  them,  they  are  accustom- 
ed to  make  over  sincere  and  well-meaning  mem- 
bers of  other  churches,  not  to  the  wrath,  but  to  the 
"  uncovenanted  mercies"  of  God.  But  "  uncovenant- 
ed  mercy"  is  a  non-entity.  ^11  i\\Q  mercy  manifested 
towards  our  race  is  manifested  in  and  through  Jesus 
Christ,  our  Saviour,  in  virtue  of  th€  eternal  covenant 
between  the  Father  and  the  Son.  And  as  to  union 
with  the  Father,  the  Saviour  uses  this  strong  lan- 
guage: "All  things  are  delivered  unto  me  of  my 
Father:  and  no  man  knoweth  the  Son  but  the  Father: 
neither  knoweth  any  man  the  Father  save  the  Son, 
and  he  to  whomsoever  the  Son  will  reveal  him." — 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  23 

(Matt.  xi.  27.)  And  again,  (John  xiv.  6,)  "Jesus  saith 
unto  him,  1  am  the  way,  the  truth,  and  the  Ufe;  no 
MAN  co7}ieth  unto  the  Father  but  by  me.^^  If  the 
Bishop  whose  words  have  been  quoted  did  not  know 
what  is  here  so  plainly  asserted,  that  there  can  be  no 
union  with  the  Father,  except  •'  in  the  way  of  Christ's 
appointment,"  what  is  to  be  thought  of  his  theologi- 
cal attainments?  If  he  did  know  it,  what  is  to  be 
thought  of  his  candor?^ 

These  quotations  may  serve  as  a  sample  of  the 
manner  in  which  the  great  body  of  the  Christian  peo- 
ple of  this  country,  and  their  pastors,  are  spoken  of  by 
this  Puseyite  party  in  the  Episcopal  Church.  Their 
great  and  apparently  increasing  influence  in  their  own 
communion,  the  arrogance  of  their  claims,  the  violence 
of  their  attacks  upon  the  rights  and  liberties  of  other 
Churches,  the  pernicious  tendency  of  their  doctrines, 

1  The  author  has  recently  met  with  a  pamphlet  from  the  pen  of  a 
distinguished  Episcopal  writer  and  divine,  in  which  the  notion  of 
uncovenanted  mercy  is  thus  disposed  of: — 

"As  to  the  consignment  of  all  who  are  not  favoured  with  Episco- 
pal ordinances,  '■to  the  uncovenanted  mercies  of  God,^  Mr.  M.  knows 
no  such  mercies ;  he  can  find  nothing  in  the  Bible  about  any  mercy 
for  sinners,  but  that  which  the  precious  blood  of  the  everlasting  cove- 
nant has  purchased,  and  which  God  hath  promised  but  to  members  of 
the  covenant  of  grace.  Should  he  offer  his  Christian  brethren  of 
other  churches  no  better  consolation  than  '  uncovenanted  mercy,^  he 
would  think  it  equivalent  to  an  opinion  that  their  souls  are  utterly 
destitute  of  hope.  But,  blessed  be  God,  he  is  not  obliged  to  regard 
them  as  in  a  condition  so  miserable.  With  all  his  heart  he  can  carry 
to  them,  as  beloved  brethren  in  Christ,  the  overfloviring  '  cup  of  bless- 
ing ;'  and  can  say  to  all  that  '  love  the  Lord  Jesus  in  sincerity,'  of 
whatever  name  or  form,  *  He  that  believeth  in  the  Son  hath  everlast- 
ing life;'  and  'there  is  no  condemnation  to  them  that  are  in  Christ 
Jesus,  who  walk  not  after  the  flesh,  but  after  the  Spirit,'  " — Statement 
of''''  the  Rev.  Mr.  (now  Bishop)  Mcllvaine,  in  answer  to  the  Rev.  (now 
Bishop)  H.  U.  Onderdonky  D.  Z?.,"  dated  West  Point,  Oct.  15,  1827. 


24  THE    niGH-CHURCir    DOCTRINE    OF 

and  their  activity  in  labouring  to  substitute  a  lifeless 
formalism  for  genuine  Christianity,  have  left  it  no 
longer  an  open  question,  whether  it  is  the  duty  of  true 
Protestants,  both  in  the  Episcopal  and  other  Churches, 
to  use  all  appropriate  means  for  repelling  their  bold 
and  dangerous  aggressions.  If  we  refuse  to  do  this, 
we  betray  the  cause  of  truth  and  righteousness,  the 
defence  of  which  is  committed,  in  his  measure,  to 
every  friend  and  follower  of  the  Saviour. 

The  author  yields  to  no  one  in  the  respect  he  enter- 
tains for  the  fcehngs  of  those  excellent  persons  who 
deprecate  religious  controversy,  and  to  whose  minds 
a  discussion  like  the  present  suggests  no  idea  but  that 
of  an  attack  on  another  denomination.  But  surely  a 
Presbyterian  is  not  to  be  charged  with  disturbing  the 
harmony  of  the  Christian  sects,  because  he  ventures, 
in  the  face  of  many  rude  and  flagrant  allegations  to 
the  contrary,  to  maintain  that  he  is  a  member  of  the 
Church  of  Christ!  If  our  title  to  a  place  at  the  Lord's 
table  is  not  worth  vindicating,  it  is  not  worth  having. 
And  let  it  not  be  supposed  that  these  lordly  preten- 
sions against  which  we  are  contending,  will  die  away 
of  themselves.  This  is  not  the  course  of  such  things. 
The  doctrines  in  question  are  too  congenial  to  corrupt 
human  nature,  and  find  too  much  nutriment  in  the 
love  of  pomp  and  power  so  characteristic  of  hierar- 
chies, to  be  readily  relinquished.  It  is  only  a  few  years 
since  they  re-appeared,  in  their  present  offensive  form, 
in  this  country;  and  their  progress  has,  up  to  this  time, 
been  as  rapid  as  it  has  been  desolating  among  the 
clergy  of  our  sister-church.  Not  a  few  even  have 
been  carried  away  by  them,  who,  before  the  publica- 
tion of  the  Oxford  Tracts,  were  regarded  as  the  de- 
cided opposers  of  all  such  exclusive  and  unscriptural 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  25 

sentiments.  And,  besides,  if  these  usurpations  are 
not  resisted,  it  will  soon  come  to  be  taken  for  granted 
that  they  are  well-founded.  Let  this  party  have  the 
public  ear  to  themselves,  and  go  on  for  a  few  years 
longer  proclaiming  with  ceaseless  iteration  that  they 
are  "  the  Church,"  and  that  all  others  are  "  sectaries," 
and  "  dissenters,"  and  the  world  will  believe  that  it 
is  so.  Our  protest,  to  be  effective,  must  be  made 
now. — And  even  if  we  could  forget  ourselves,  some- 
thing is  due  to  the  sainted  dead.  The  doctrine  we 
are  opposing  goes  to  declare,  that  "  all  those  glorious 
churches  which  have  flourished  in  Geneva,  Holland, 
France,  Scotland,  England,  Ireland,  &c.,  since  the  Re- 
formation; and  all  which  have  spread  and  are  spread- 
ing through  this  vast  continent;  that  those  heroes  of 
the  truth,  who,  though  they  bowed  not  to  the  mitre, 
rescued  millions  from  the  man  of  sin,  lighted  up  the 
lamp  of  genuine  religion,  and  left  it,  burning  with  a 
pure  and  steady  flame,  to  the  generation  following; 
that  all  those  faithful  ministers  and  all  those  private 
Christians,  who,  though  not  of  the  hierarchy,  adorned 
the  doctrine  of  God,  their  Saviour,  living  in  faith, 
dying  in  faith,  scores,  hundreds,  thousands  of  them, 
going  away  to  their  Father's  house,  under  the  strong 
consolations  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  with  anticipated  hea- 
ven in  their  hearts,  and  its  hallelujahs  on  their  lips; 
that  all,  all  were  without  the  pale  of  the  visible 
Church;  were  destitute  of  covenanted  grace;  and 
left  the  world  Avithout  any  chance  for  eternal  life  but 
that  unpledged,  unpromised  mercy  which  their  ac- 
cusers charitably  hope  may  be  extended  to  such  as 
labour  under  involuntary  or  unavoidable  error  !"^ — 

>  Dr.  Jolm  M.  Mason. 
3 


26  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

It  would  be  treachery  to  the  dead,  then,  to  remain 
silent. 

Opposition,  able  and  vigorous,  this  party  does  meet 
with  from  the  evangelical  portion  of  their  own  com- 
munion. If  any  of  this  class  of  Episcopalians  are 
surprised  that  ivc  should  begin  to  resent  the  unchris- 
tian treatment  we  have  met  with  from  their  High 
Church  brethren,  let  me  put  the  case  to  them  in  the 
language  of  one  of  their  own  ministers— the  late  ex- 
cellent Rector  of  St.  Andrew's  Church,  Philadelphia, 
m  whom  his  own  denomination  has  lost  a  faithful  and 
zealous  pastor,  and  the  "  common  Christianity"  a 
pious,  able,  and  resolute  defender.  "  How  would  it 
strike  us  (asks  Dr.  Clark,  in  his  '  Letters  on  the 
Church,')  if  another  denomination  were  to  assert,  to 
preach  from  the  pulpit,  and  publish  through  religious 
papers,  that  the  Episcopal  Church  was  no  Church  at 
all — a  mere  unauthorized  human  institution — that  it 
had  no  valid  or  authorized  ministry — that  its  preach- 
ers were  nothing  more  than  laymen — that  it  had  no 
sacraments — that  baptism  and  the  holy  supper,  being 
administered  by  unauthorized  hands,  were  of  no  effi- 
cacy; and  that  if  any  belonging  to  this  body  were 
saved,  it  would  not  be  because  they  had  been  brought 
within  the  covenant  promises,  but  because  God  in  his 
sovereignty,  'will  have  mercy  on  whom  He  will  have 
mercy.'  Were  a  large  and  influential  denomination 
of  Christians,  to  assume  this  stand  and  proclaim  these 
views,  would  not  our  prejudices  be  aroused  ?  Would 
you  not  then  say,  with  some  reason, '  Shall  we  sit  still 
and  see  ourselves  swept  off  the  face  of  Christendom 
by  the  restless  spirits  of  the  age?'  "  Such,  precisely, 
is  the  course  the  High-Church  party  has  been  for 
several  years  pursuing  towards  all  the  unprelatical 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  27 

churches.  The  indications  are  numerous  and  decisive 
throughout  the  country,  that  these  churches  have 
borne  with  it  until  their  meekness  and  patience  are 
well-nigh  exhausted.  And  it  may  be  safely  left  to 
candid  Episcopalians  to  say,  whether  they  can  with 
reason  be  required  to  keep  silence  any  longer.  We  look 
upon  the  party  which  is  spreading  such  ruin  through 
their  communion,  notwithstanding  their  strong  protes- 
tations against  Popery,  as  virtually  in  league  with 
Rome.  We  regard  the  scheme  of  religion  they  are 
inculcating,  as  a  system  of  formalism  emuiently  adapt- 
ed to  ensnare  and  destroy  the  souls  of  men.  And  when 
we  see  them  putting  forth  the  most  strenuous  exer- 
tions to  propagate  this  system,  and,  as  a  means  of 
bringing  people  to  submit  to  it,  proclaiming  in  sermons 
and  in  pamphlets,  in  the  house  and  by  the  way, 
that  their  Church  is  the  only  true  Church,  and  that  all 
the  Christian  Ministers  in  this  land,  except  the  Romish 
Ecclesiastics  and  themselves,  are  "  treading  in  the 
steps  of  Korah,  Dathan,  and  Abiram,"  we  cannot,  in 
justice  to  the  Master  we  serve,  remain  silent.  We 
cannot  suffer  them  to  disseminate  their  pernicious 
heresies,  without  lifting  up  a  warning  voice  agahist 
them.  We  cannot  see  them  abetting  the  Papal  Anti- 
Christ  in  his  warfare  against  Christ  and  his  Church, 
without  doing  what  we  can  to  convince  Protestants 
of  every  name,  that  it  is  as  much  their  duty  to  oppose 
the  Popery  of  Puseyism  as  the  Popery  of  Rome. 

Such  are  some  of  the  considerations  which  have  led 
the  author  to  undertake  the  preparation  of  a  small 
volume,  on  the  High-Church  doctrine  of  the  Apos- 
tolical Succession.  It  is  his  purpose  to  bring  the 
lofty  and  exclusive  claims  which  have  been  of  late,  so 
ambitiously  thrust  upon  the  public  attention,  to  the 


28  THE    HIGII-CHURCH    DOCTaiNE    OP 

test  of  Scripture  and  history.  If  in  doing  this,  the 
question  between  Prelacy  and  Parity  shall  be  found 
to  require  a  somewhat  minute  investigation,  it  will 
be  borne  in  mind,  that  there  can  be  no  controversy 
between  non-Episcopalians  and  those  who  disavow 
the  arrogant  assumptions  which  have  been  advert- 
ed to,  and  who,  with  the  British  as  well  as  conti- 
nental Reformers,  acknowledge  the  scriptural  cha- 
racter of  Churches  organized  on  the  principles  of 
ministerial  parity.  With  Episcopalians  of  this  sort, 
we  desire  to  cherish  that  intimate  and  sacred  fellow- 
ship which  ought  ever  to  prevail  among  the  various 
branches  of  the  one  household  of  faith.  We  cheer- 
fully concede  to  them  the  privilege  we  claim  for  our- 
selves, of  choosing  that  form  of  ecclesiastical  polity 
wiiich  they  believe  to  be  most  conformable  to  the 
Apostolic  model.  We  look,  it  is  true,  upon  Diocesan 
Episcopacy,  as  incompatible  with  the  perfection  of 
a  Church ;  but  we  admit  that  it  is  compatible  with 
the  being  of  a  Church.  While  lamenting  that  our 
Episcopal  brethren  should  be  .deprived  of  the  ad- 
vantages of  that  "  more  excellent  way"  which  we 
find  laid  down  in  the  word  of  God,  we  are  far  from 
believing  that  they  are  no  part  of  the  Church  of  Christ. 
Our  controversy  is  not  with  that  portion  of  their  com- 
munion who  reciprocate  the  truly  catholic  senti- 
ments on  this  subject,  which  have  ever  characterized 
the  Presbyterian  Church,  but  with  those  who  main- 
tain that  Prelacy  cvlone  is  authorized  by  the  word  of 
God,  and  that  there  is  no  Ministry  excepting  that 
which  has  descended  from  the  Apostles  through  an 
unbroken  and  distinctly  traceable  line  of  Prelates. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  29 


CPIAPTER  II. 


STATEMENT    OF    THE    QUESTION. 

We  come  now  to  inquire  into  the  doclrine  of  tlie 
*^  Apostolical  Succession/'  as  held  by  High-Church- 
men and  Puseyites.  This  shall  be  stated  in  their  own 
words. 

"We  live  in  a  Church  (says  Bishop  Beveridge^) 
wherein  the  Apostolical  line  hath,  through  all  ages, 
been  preserved  entire,  there  having  been  a  constant 
succession  of  such  Bishops  in  it  as  were  truly  and 
properly  successors  to  the  Apostles  by  virtue  of  that 
Apostolical  imposition  of  hands  which,  being  begun 
by  the  Apostles,  hath  been  continued  from  one  to 
another,  ever  since  their  time,  down  to  ours.  Bt/ 
ivhich  means,  the  same  spirit  which  was  breathed 
by  our  Lord  into  his  Apostles  is,  together  with  their 
office,  transmitted  to  their  lawful  successors,  the  pias- 
ters and  governors  of  our  Church  at  this  time ;  and 
acts,  moves,  and  assists,  at  the  administration  of  the 
several  parts  of  the  Apostolical  office  in  our  days  as 
much  as  ever.'' 

Dr.  Hickes,  denominated  Bishop  and  Confessor  by 
the  Oxford  Tract  writers, thus  speaks: — "Bishops  are 
appointed  to  succeed  the  Apostles,  and  like  them  to 
stand   in   Christ's  place,   and   exercise   the   Kingly, 

1  This  and  most  of  the  following  quotations  are  given  as  furnished 
cither  by  Mr.  Powell,  the  able  Methodist  Episcopal  writer,  or  by  Dr. 
Smyth,  in  his  elaborate  and  valuable  work  on  the  Apostolical  Suc- 
cession. 

3* 


30  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

Priestl)^,  and  Prophetical  office  over  their  flocks 

They  stand  in  God's  and  Christ's  stead  over  their 
flocks ;  the  clergy  as  well  as  the  people,  are  to  be 
snbject  to  them,  as  to  the  Vicc-Gerents  of  our  Lord." 

Dr.  Hook,  the  present  Vicar  of  Leeds,  already  men- 
tioned, says, — "  The  officer  whom  vi^e  now  call  a 
Bishop,  was  at  first  called  aa  Apostle,  although  after- 
wards it  was  thought  better  to  confine  the  title  of 
Apostle  to  those  who  had  seen  the  Lord  Jesus,  while 
their  successors,  exercising  the  same  rights  and 
AUTHORITY,  though  uueudowed  with  miraculous  pow- 
ers, contented  themselves  (!)  with  the  designation  of 
Bishops.  After  this,  the  title  was  never  given  to  the 
second  order  of  the  ministry.  .  .  The  Prelates  who  at 
this  present  time,  rule  the  Churches  of  these  realms, 
were  validly  ordained  by  others,  who  by  means  of  an 
tmbroken  spiritual  descent  of  ordination,  derived  their 

mission  from  the  Apostles  and  from  our  Lord 

Our  ordinations  descend  in  a  direct,  unbroken  line 
from  Peter  and  Paul." 

"Before  Jesus  Christ  left  the  world,  he  breathed 
the  Holy  Spirit  into  the  apostles,  giving  them  the 
po\ver  of  transmitting  this  precious  gift  to  others 
by  prayer,  and  the  imposition  of  hands :  the  apostles 
did  so  transmit  it  to  others,  and  they  again  to  others ; 
and  in  this  way  it  has  been  preserved  in  the  world  to 
the  present  day."  ( Outline  of  the  doctrine,  as  drawn 
by  Bishop  Meade,  himself  an  opposer  of  Puseyism.) 

"The  real  ground  of  our  authority  (say  the  Oxford 
Tract  writers)  is  our  Apostolical  descent."  "The 
spirit,  the  sacred  gift,  has  been  handed  down  to  our 
present  bishops."  "We  must  necessarily  consider 
none  ordained,  who  have  not  been  thus  ordained." 

"  The  supposition  is,  (says  Dr.  How,  of  New  York,) 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  31 

that  Christ  established  distinct  grades  of  ministers,  and 
conferred  upon  the  highest  grade  the  exckisive  power 
of  ordaining.  When  a  minister  of  the  highest  grade, 
then,  ordains,  Christ  ordains ;  when  a  minister  of  the 
second  grade  ordains,  it  is  not  Christ  that  ordains,  but 
man.  Thus  Episcopal  ordination  confers  the  sacer- 
dotal office;  Presbyterial  ordination  does  not.  If, 
therefore,  the  former  ordination  be  laid  aside,  and  the 
latter  be  substituted  in  its  place,  the  sacerdotal  office 
must  cease  to  exist ;  and  as  there  can  be  no  church 
without  a  ministry,  the  church  must  cease  to  exist 
also."  Again  he  says,  "Wilful  opposition  to  Episco- 
pacy is  certainly  rebellion  against  God,  and  must, 
therefore,  exclude  from  his  presence.'' 

The  views  of  Dodwell  and  of  the  Bishop  of  the 
Diocese  of  New  York,  have  already  been  presented, 
to  the  effect,  that  "  the  bishops  alone  can  unite  us  with 
the  Father,"  and  that  all  who  are  not  connected  with 
prelatical  churches,  are  in  a  fair  way  to  be  lost. 

It  should  be  added,  that  many  Episcopalians  who 
hold  to  the  doctrine  that  their  prelates  are  lineal  suc- 
cessors of  the  Apostles,  reject  the  sentiment  that  salva- 
tion is  restricted  to  churches  under  Diocesan  Bishops. 
The  passages  that  have  been  quoted,  however,  exhibit 
the  High  Church  doctrine,  so  popular  just  now,  on 
both  sides  the  Atlantic.  According  to  this  theory,  the 
Christian  Ministry  was  originally  established  in  three 
orders,  called,  ever  since  the  apostolic  age,  bishops, 
presbyters  or  elders,  and  deacons.  The  first  of  these 
orders,  are  the  successors  of  the  Apostles,  and  can 
trace  up  their  spiritual  descent  in  an  unbroken  per- 
sonal line  to  the  twelve.  They  possess,  miraculous 
gifts  alone  excepted,  the  same  authority  and  powers 
with  the  Apostles.     They  have  received,  by  regular 


32  THE    HIGII-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

transmission,  that  peculiar  gift  or  grace,  sometimes 
called  "the  grace  of  the  Episcopal  order,"  and  at 
other  times  the  "gift  of  the  Holy  Ghost."  This  gift 
was  communicated  hy  our  Saviour  to  the  Apostles 
when  he  breathed  on  them,  and  said,  "Receive  ye 
the  Holy  Ghost,"  and  it  has  been  transmitted  from 
one  generation  of  Prelates  to  another,  down  to  the 
present  day,  by  prayer  and  the  imposition  of  hands. 
All  Avho  have  been  properly  ordained,  have  inherited 
it  and  the  capacity  of  communicating  it  to  others, 
irrespective  of  their  moral  characters.  Impalpable 
and  undefinable  as  it  is,  this  gift  is  a  real  depositum, 
by  virtue  of  which  the  recipient  "obtains  the  power 
of  enduing  the  element  of  water  in  the  Sacrament  of 
Baptis-m  with  mysterious  efficacy  for  the  remission  of 
sins,  and  of  converting  bread  and  wine  in  the  Lord's 
Supper  into  the  real  body  and  blood  of  Christ;"  while 
these,  in  turn,  (not  the  word  of  God,)  become  the 
instruments  of  regeneration  and  justification.  With 
this  extraordinary  endowment,  is  associated  the  sole 
power  of  ordination  and  of  governing  the  church. 
The  church  is  committed  to  the  exclusive  control  and 
guardianship  of  the  Bishops.  They  are  the  only 
channel  through  which  God  communicates  grace  to 
mankind.  No  man  is  ordained  who  has  not  been 
ordained  by  a  Prelate.  No  organization  which  de- 
clines prelatical  jurisdiction,  is  a  branch  of  the  church. 
No  individual  who  is  disconnected  with  a  Bishop,  can 
Safely  conclude  that  he  is  in  the  way  of  salvation. 

Such  is  a  summary  of  the  High-Church  theory.  It 
is  incumbent  on  them  ta  establish  every  one  of  the 
positions  just  stated.  If  they  fail  in  a  single  instance, 
the  whole  system  falls  to  the  ground.  Their  proofs, 
too,  must  be  cogent  and  irrefutable.     They  must  pro- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  33 

duce  a  Divine  right  for  the  system.  Conjecture, 
probability,  mere  human  authority,  will  not  suffice. 
If  they  have  not  a  "Thus  saith  the  Lord,"  to  rest 
upon,  they  have  nothing  which  we  are  bound  to 
respect.  They  must  have  this  in  an  explicit  form. 
"Whatever  binds  Christians  (says  the  learned  Stilling- 
fleet,)  as  a  universal,  standing  laiv,  must  be  clearly 
revealed  as  such,  and  laid  down  in  Scripture  in  such 
evident  terms  as  all  who  have  their  senses  exercised 
therein,  may  discern  to  have  been  the  will  of  Christ 
that  it  should  perpetually  oblige  all  believers  to  the 
world's  end,  as  is  clear  in  the  case  of  Baptism  and  the 
Lord's  Supper."^  Every  impartial  judge  will  admit 
the  reasonableness  of  this  canon,  as  applied  to  the 
case  under  consideration.  Here  is  a  scheme  which 
challenges  universal  acquiescence  and  obedience,  un- 
der penalty  of  everlasting  perdition.  It  looks  with 
complacency  upon  the  Greek  and  Roman  Churches, 
and  pronounces  four-fifths  of  Protestant  Christendom 
to  be  without  ministers,  churches,  or  ordinances.  It 
differs  in  so  many  and  such  radical  particulars  from 
the  commonly  received  doctrines  of  Christianity,  that 
the  two  systems  may  be  fairly  regarded  as  two 
Gospels.  Now  such  a  scheme,  we  maintain,  must 
be  able  to  vindicate  its  high  and  exclusive  preten- 
sions, by  clear  and  undoubted  scriptural  authority. 
It  is  not  enough  to  adduce  isolated  texts  which  will 
bear  a  construction  favourable  to  it.  It  is  not  enough 
to  bring  forward  indirect  and  inferential  arguments 
in  support  of  it.  It  will  not  answer  to  prove 
merely  (if  that  could  be  done)  that  the  Christian 
ministry  was  originally  instituted  in  three  distinct 
orders.     It  must  be  shown  by  express  Scripture  testi- 

'  Stillingfleet's  Ircnicum,  part  i.  chap.  i. 


34  THE    niGH-CIIURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

mony  that  the  apostolic  office  was  intended  to  be  j?;er- 
mancnt ;  that  diocesan  bishops  were  ordained  to  be 
their  successors,  and  their  sole  successors;  that  they 
were  to  receive  and  transmit  through  an  unbroken 
line  of  prelates,  the  gift  of  the  Holy  Ghost;  that  the 
grace  and  mercy  of  God  were  to  be  dispensed  only 
through  these  bishops,  and  from  them,  through  the 
church  over  which  they  were  to  preside  as  a  visible 
corporation;  and  that  God,  instead  of  dealing  with 
men  individually,  and  regenerating  them  by  means  of 
his  truth,  designed  to  renew  and  justify  and  save  tliem 
only  through  the  sacraments  duly  administered  by  a 
prelatic  priesthood.     Since  this,  I  say,  is  affirmed  to 
be  the  way  of  salvation  provided  for  man,  its  advo- 
cates must  be  able  to  show  that  it  stands  forth  on  the 
pages  of  the  Bible,  with  a  distinctness  and  prominence 
which  leave  without  excuse  any  humble  and  diligent 
reader  of  the  Scriptures,  if  he  fails  to  discover  it.    This 
doctrine,  indeed,  of  the  Church  and  the  Apostolical 
Succession,  ought,  if  the  theory  before  us  be  correct, 
to  be  the  great  theme  of  the  New  Testament.    For, 
on  the  principles  of  this  school,  the  great  question 
with  every  man  must  be,  not  *'what  must  I  do  to  be 
saved?"  but  '^loliere  is  the  chu7'ch?^^    This  being  the 
case,  it  is  preposterous  to  suppose  that  the  sacred 
writers  would  thrust  into  a  corner  a  subject  of  such 
fundamental  and  absorbing  interest  to  every  human 
being.     It  is  an  impeachment  of  the  wisdom  and 
benevolence  of  the  Deity,  to  pretend  that  in  a  volume 
designed  to  instruct  men  as  to  the  plan  of  salvation, 
He  would  assign  the  essential  parts  of  that  plan  to  a 
subordinate  place,  and  teach  them  only  in  an  informal 
and  obscure  manner.     On  this  ground,  therefore,  as 
well  as  others,  we  demand  a  clear  and  authoritative 
Divine  warrant  for  every  part  of  this  system. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  35 

CHAPTER  III. 

THE    ARGUMENT    FROM    SCRIPTURE. 

We  proceed  now  to  inquire,  hoio  this  requisition  for 
proof  is  met.  And  here,  at  the  outset,  we  encounter 
a  very  curious  division  among  the  advocates  of  High- 
Church  principles.  For  while  one  class  contend  for 
their  polity  as  the  only  form  of  Church  Government 
sanctioned  in  the  Scriptures;  another,  including  the 
leading  Puseyites,  affirm  that  the  Bible  furnishes  no 
adequate  ground  for  their  system,  and  that  it  can  be 
vindicated  only  by  the  authority  of  tradition.  Thus 
in  Tract  No  8,  the  Oxford  writers  say,  "  there  is  no 
part  of  the  ecclesiastical  system  which  is  woi  faintly 
traced  in  Scripture,  and  no  part  which  is  much  more 
than  faintly  traced.'^  In  Tract  85,  it  is  conceded 
that  "  the  divine  right  of  Episcopacy,  the  Apostolical 
Succession,  the  poiuer  of  the  Churchy  &c.,  are  want- 
ing in  direct  or  satisfactory  proof,  and  are  to  be  estab- 
lisheid  if  at  all,  only  by  the  aid  of  vei^y  attenuated  and 
nicely  managed  inferential  arguments.''^  ^' Every 
one  must  allow,"  observes  the  writer,  "that  there  is 
next  to  nothing  on  the  surface  of  Scripture  about 
them,  and  very  little  even  under  the  surface,  of  a 
satisfactory  character, — a  few  striking  texts  at  most, 
scattered  up  and  down  the  inspired  volume,  or  one  or 
two  particular  passages  of  one  particular  Epistle,  or 
a  number  of  texts  which  may  mean,  but  need  not 
mean,  what  they  are  said  by  Churchmen  to  mean, 
which  say  something  looking  like  what  is  needed,  but 
with  very  little  point  and  strength,  inadequately  and 
unsatisfactorily." — Such,  in  the  view  of  many  of  its 


36  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

most  learned  and  able  expounders,  is  the  scriptural 
warrant  for  a  system  which  all  men  are  required  to 
believe  on  pain  of  damnation ! — Two  observations 
may  be  made  respecting  them  and  their  doctrine,  be- 
fore we  proceed  with  our  argument. 

1.  Every  one  will  see  the  substantial  identity  be- 
tween this  system  and  Popery.  The  radical  question 
between  Protestantism  and  Popery,  is  that  respecting 
the  rule  of  faith:  and  on  this  point,  these  writers  main- 
tain, with  the  Church  of  Rome,  that  tradition  is 
equally  a  part  of  the  rule  of  faith,  with  the  Bible. 

Where  this  principle  is  recognised,  a  door  is  opened 
which  must  eventually  let  in  all  the  errors  and  abomi- 
nations of  that  apostate  Church. 

2.  It  is  evident  that  this  class  of  High- Churchmen 
and  the  other,  are  more  at  variance  iviih  each  other, 
in  relation  to  their  ecclesiastical  polity,  than  either  of 
them  is  with  the  Protestant  world. ^  Neither  of  them 
"can  succeed  in  establishing  their  own  position  with- 
out subverting  the  position  of  the  other."  The  one 
party  "  cannot  possibly  demonstrate  that  Episcopacy, 
though  divine  in  origin  and  absolutely  binding,  is 
known  to  be  so  only  by  tradition,  without  thereby 
disproving  that  its  necessity  is  taught  in  Scripture." 
Nor  can  the  other  party  demonstrate  that  it  is  clearly 
and  adequately  taught  in  Scripture,  without  thereby 
nullifying  the  argument  drawn  from  the  alleged  ab- 
sence of  any  such  scriptural  warrant,  in  favour  of 
tradition. — Such  is  the  harmony  on  this  point  among 
those  who  glory  in  their  "  Catholic  unity,"  and  who 
agree  in  consigning  all  unprelatical  Churches  to  "  un- 
covenanted  mercy." 

With  these  comments,  we  take  our  leave  of  that 

•  See  on  this  point,  Bib.  Repertory,  vol.  xv.  p.  402. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  37 

portion  of  the  Piiseyite  body  whose  views  have  been 
quoted;  for  argument  could  add  nothing  to  the  force 
of  their  confession,  that  their  system  is  not  to  be  found 
in  the  Word  of  God.  This  position  we  are  now  to 
vindicate  against  the  other  division  of  the  High  Church 
party,  who  contend  that  the  system  is  distinctly  and 
exclusively  taught  in  the  Scriptures. 

The  first  position  it  is  incumbent  upon  those  to 
establish,  with  whom  we  are  now  to  argue,  is,  that 
the  Apostolic  office  was  designed  to  be  permanent. 
We  do  not  ask  for  proof  that  a  permanent  govern- 
ment of  some  kind  was  prescribed  for  the  Church, 
but  we  want  the  point  specifically  made  out,  that  the 
•Apostolic  office  was  designed  to  be,  not  extraordinary 
and  temporary,  but  ordinary  and  perpetual.  No 
direct  Scripture  statement  to  this  efiect  has  yet  been 
produced.  It  is  not  pretended  that  the  sacred  writers 
say,  in  so  many  words,  that  this  was  to  be  a  perma- 
nent office.  All  the  evidence  adduced  in  support  of 
the  opinion  is  inferential.  Before  we  examine  this 
evidence,  it  is  necessary  to  inquire  into  the  qualifica- 
tions and  powers  of  the  Apostleship.  It  may  be 
well  to  note,  in  passing,  how  well  the  qualifications 
and  powers  of  the  so-called  Apostles  of  our  day,  cor- 
respond with  those  of  the  primitive  Apostles. 

The  simple,  primitive  meaning  of  the  term  apostle, 
is,  one  sent,  a  messenger.  In  this  general  sense  it  is 
several  times  used  in  the  New  Testament.  Thus, 
2  Cor.  vni.  23,  the  persons  chosen  and  sent  by  the 
Churches  to  carry  the  money  collected  in  Greece  to 
the  poor  brethren  at  Jerusalem,  are  called  Apostles. 
"  Whether  our  brethren  be  inquired  of,  they  are  the 
messengers  (Gr.  a?to9ro?iot,  Apostles,)  of  the  Churches, 
and  the  glory  of  Christ  ^'     Paul  also  apphes  the  term 

4 


38  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

to  Epaphroditus  who  had  been  sent  to  him  by  the 
Church  at  Philippi,  during  his  imprisonment  at  Rome. 
"  Yet  I  supposed  it  necessary  to  send  to  you  Epaphro- 
ditus, my  brother  and  companion  in  labour,  and 
fellow -soldier,  but  your  messenger  (Gr.  ajioaroxo^, 
Apostle,)  and  he  that  ministered  to  my  wants." 
(Phil.  ii.  25.)  In  this  general  sense  it  is  applied,  in 
one  instance,  to  our  Saviour  himself,  as  being  sent 
of  the  Father  to  be  the  Saviour  of  men.  (Heb.  iii.  1.) 
"  Wherefore,  holy  brethren,  partakers  of  the  heavenly 
calling,  consider  the  Apostle  and  High  Priest  of  our 
profession,  Christ  Jesus." 

The  word,  however,  is  usually  employed  in  the 
New  Testament  in  a  more  restricted  sense,  viz.  to 
denote  the  twelve  *^postles,  or  those  who  were  Apos- 
tles by  way  of  eminence.  When  our  Saviour  sent 
forth  the  twelve,  "  he  named  them  Apostles."  (Luke 
vi.  13.)  They  are  thenceforward  nspoken  of  as  "  the 
Apostles,"  ''the  Apostles  of  Christ,"  and  ''the 
Twelve."  To  this  band,  on  the  death  of  Judas, 
Matthias  was  added:  "He  was  numbered  with  the 
eleven  Apostles:" — and,  after  him,  Paul,  who,  in  all 
that  he  says  in  his  epistles  on  the  subject  of  his  Apos- 
tleship,  is  evidently  to  be  understood  as  using  the 
expression  in  that  peculiar  and  emphatic  sense  in 
which  it  was  applied  to  the  twelve.  As  this  is  the 
sense  in  which  modern  prelates  claim  to  be  their  suc- 
cessors, it  is  of  radical  importance  to  ascertain  what 
were  the  functions  and  powers  of  the  original  Apos- 
tles. 

This  subject  has  been  well  treated  by  various  wri- 
ters; but  no  one  has  presented  the  scriptural  account 
of  the  Apostleship  in  a  more  lucid  and  comprehensive 
manner,  than  Dr.  Isaac  Barrow  a  learned  and  candid 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  39 

Episcopal  Divine,  in  his  treatise  on  the  Pope's  Supre- 
macy. ^  I  am  happy  to  borrow  the  argument  which 
he  wielded  so  effectively  m  confuting  the  Pope's  pre- 
tensions to  the  Apostleship,  to  repel  those  of  the  High 
Church  Bishops  of  his  own  sect. 

"  The  Apostolical  office,  as  such,  was  personal  and 
temporary ;  and  therefore,  according  to  its  nature  and 
design,  not  successive  or  communicable  to  others  in. 
perpetual  descendence  from  them." 

"  It  was,  as  such,  in  all  respects  extraordinary,  con- 
ferred in  a  special  manner,  designed  for  special 
purposes,  discharged  by  special  aids,  endowed  with 
special  privileges,  as  was  needful  for  the  propagation 
of  Christianity  and  founding  of  Churches. 

To  that  office  it  was  requisite  that  the  person  should 
have  an  immediate  designation  and  commission 
from  God;  such  as  St.  Paul'  so  often  doth  insist  on 
for  asserting  his  title  to  the  office :  "  Paul,  an  Apostle, 
not  from  men  or  by  man" — "  Not  by  men,"  saith 
Chrysostom;  "  this  is  a  property  of  the  Apostles." 

It  was  requisite  that  an  Apostle  should  be  able  to 
attest  concerning  our  Lord'^s  resurrection  or  ascen- 
sion, either  immediately,  as  the  twelve,  or  by  evident 
consequence,  as  St.  Paul:  thus  St.  Peter  implied,  at 
the  choice  of  Matthias :  "  Wherefore  of  those  men 
which  have  companied  with  us — must  one  be  or- 
dained to  be  a  ivitness  with  us  of  the  resurrection:" 
And,  "Am  I  not,"  saith  St.  Paul,  "an  Apostle?  Have 
I  not  seen  the  Lord?"  According  to  that  of  Ananias, 
"  The  God  of  our  fathers  hath  chosen  thee,  that  thou 
shouldest  know  His  will,  and  see  that  Just  One,  and 
shouldest  hear  the  voice  of  His  mouth;  for  thou  shall 

1  Vide  pp.  201-4,  Hughes'  Ed.  Lend.  1831. 


40  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

bear  witness  imto  all  men  of  what  thou  hast  seen  and 
heard." 

It  was  needful  also,  that  an  Apostle  should  he  en- 
dowed with  miraculous  gifts  and  graces,  enabling 
him  both  to  assure  his  authority  and  to  execute  his 
office:  wherefore  St.  Paul  calleth  these ■  the  "  marks 
of  an  Apostle,"  the  "  which  were  wrought  by  liim 
among  the  Corinthians  in  all  patience  (or  persever- 
ingly)  in  signs  and  wonders  and  mighty  deeds." 

It  was  also,  in  St.  Chrysostom's  opinion,  proper  to 
an  Apostle,  that  he  should  be  able,  according  to  his 
discretion,  in  a  certain  and  conspicuous  manner,  to 
impart  spiritual  gifts ;  as  St.  Peter  and  St.  John  did 
at  Samaria,  which  to  do,  according  to  that  father,  was 
"  the  peculiar  gift  and  privilege  of  the  Apostles." 

It  was  also  a  privilege  of  an  Apostle,  by  virtue  of 
his  commission  from  Christ,  to  instruct  all  nations 
in  the  doctrine  and  law  of  Christ:  he  had  right  and 
warrant  to  exercise  his  function  every  where — "  His 
charge  was  universal  and  indefinite ;  the  whole  world 
was  his  province;"  he  was  not  affixed  to  any  one 
place,  nor  could  be  excluded  from  any,  he  was  (as  St. 
Cyril  calleth  him)  "  an  oecumenical  judge,"  and  "  an 
instructor  of  all  the  sub-celestial  world." 

Apostles  also  did  govern  in  an  absolute  manner, 
according  to  discretion,  as  being  guided  by  infalli- 
ble assistance,  to  the  which  they  might,  on  occasion, 
appeal,  and  affirm,  "It  hath  seemed  good  to  the  Holy 
Ghost  and  us."  Whence  their  writings  have  passed 
for  inspired,  and,  therefore,  canonical,  or  certain  rules 
of  faith  and  practice. 

It  did  belong  to  them  to  found  churches,  to  consti- 
tute pastors,  to  settle  orders,  to  correct  offences,  to 
perform  all  such  acts  of  sovereign  spiritual  power,  in 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  41 

virtue  of  the  same  divine  assistance,  ^according  to 
the  authority  which  the  Lord  had  given  them  for 
edification,'  as  we  see  practised  by  St.  Paul." 

Such,  in  the  view  of  this  learned  and  eminent 
divine,  was  the  Apostolic  office.  Many  other  Epis- 
copal writers  give  the  same  account  of  it.  Indeed,  it 
is  one  of  those  subjects  on  which  there  has  been  until 
lately  very  little  difference  of  opinion  among  Pro- 
testants— (nor,  indeed,  is  there  among  real  Pro- 
testants now,  for  the  Puseyites  consistently  spurn 
this  appellation.)  Accordingly  on  turning  to  the  His- 
tory of  the  Westminster  Assembly  of  Divines,^  we 
find  that  in  that  body,  "the  office  of  Apostles  was 
declared  to  be  o\\\y  pro  tempore  and  extraordinary, 
for  the  eight  following  reasons: — 1.  They  were  im- 
mediately called  by  Christ.    2.  They  had  seen  Christ. 

3.  Their  commission  was  through  the  whole  world. 

4.  They  were  endued  with  the  spirit  of  infallibility  in 
delivering  the  truths  of  doctrine   to   the  Churches. 

5.  They  only  by  special  commission  were  set  apart 
to   be   personal   witnesses   of  Christ's    resurrection. 

6.  They  had  power  to  give  the  Holy  Ghost.  7.  They 
were  appointed  to  go  through  the  world  to  settle 
Churches  in  a  new  form  appointed  by  Christ.  8.  They 
had  the  inspection  and  care  of  all  the  Churches." 

These  authorities  are  quoted  at  length,  because,  if 
they  are  to  be  relied  U'gon,  they  settle  thewhole  ques- 
tion. Unless  the  Protestant  world  has  totally  miscon- 
ceived the  nature  of  the  Apostolic  office,  it  is  prepos- 
terous to  argue  that  that  office  is  in  existence  still — 
or,  indeed,  that  it  could  be  perpetuated  without  a 
constant  display  of  miracles.  To  prove  this,  it  is  only 
necessary  to  take  the  specification  of  its  powers  and 

'  Hethenngton,  p.  138. 

4* 


42  THE    HIGII-CnURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

f auctions,  as  furnished  by  Barrow  or  any  other  com- 
petent writer,  and  apply  it  to  the  lofty  pretensions  of 
any  modern  Bishop.    Who  among  them  was  "  imme- 
diately called''  to  the  "  Apostleship"  by  Christ?  Who 
of  them  has  seen  Christ?    Who  was  a  witness  of  His 
resurrection?   Whose  diocese  is  co-extensive  with  the 
globe?    Who  possesses  miraculous  gifts?    Who  can 
impart  the  Holy  Ghost?     The  last  of  these  functions, 
it  is  true,  is  claimed :  and  it  is  not  long  since  a  Pro- 
testant Episcopal  Bishop  was  understood  to  assert  on 
a  public  occasion,  that  "  the  Holy  Ghost  was  as  really 
communicated  when  a  Bishop  lays  his  hands  upon 
the  head  of  a  candidate  for  the  priesthood  in  the  ordi- 
nation service,  and  says,  *  Receive  the  Holy  Ghost, ^ 
as  it  was  bij  the  laying  on  of  the  hands  of  the  Jlpos- 
tles?^     But  it  will  be  time  enough  to  believe  a  state- 
ment which  it  revolts  one's  Christian  sensibilities  even 
to  repeat,  when  it  is  proved.     And  as  regards  the 
power  of  bestowing  "miraculous  gifts,'^  if  it  be  con- 
ceded that   Bishops  lack  this  endowment,   the   ob- 
vious reply  is,  that  their  office  must,  then,  differ  in  a 
very  important  particular  from  that  of  the  Apostles. 
And  if  it  be  still  further  conceded,  that  these  Bishops 
"  were   not  called   by   immediate   revelation"   from 
Christ — that   they   were   neither   "  witnesses   of  his 
resurrection,"  nor  have  "  seen  him"  since — ^and  that 
their  "  commissions  are  not  universal" — then,  we 
would  ask  on  what  conceivable  ground  they  pretend 
to  have  inherited  the  "  Apostleship,"  when,  on  their 
own  confession,  they  lack  several  of  the  most  essen- 
tiai  attributes  of  the  othce.    It  is  like  a  man's  pretend- 
ing to  be  a  king,  who  is  without  royal  descent,  with- 
out a  crown,  throne,  kingdom,  or  subjects. 

We  do  not,  however,  acknowledge  their  right  to  be 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  43 

SO  modest.  If  men^et  themselves  up  to  be  apostles, 
and  challenge  our  homage  as  "the  vicegerents  of 
Christ,"  we  insist  upon  it  that  they  shall  authenticate 
their  claim  to  the  Jipostleship,  and  not  to  a  figment 
of  their  own  creation,  which  under  the  same  name,they 
would  put  in  the  place  of  it.  Let  them  attempt  this, 
and  the  world  will  soon  see  the  emptiness  of  their 
pretensions,  and  will  conclude,  with  Dr.  Barrow, 
(whose  language  I  shall  again  quote,)  that  the  Apos- 
tles as  such  had  no  successors. 

"Now  such  an  office,"  he  says,  " consisting  of  so 
many  extraordinary  privileges  and  miraculous  pow- 
ers, which  were  requisite  for  the  foundation  of  the 
Church,  and  the  diffusion  of  Christianity  against  the 
manifold  difficulties  and  disadvantages  which  it  must 
then  needs  encounter,  teas  not  designed  to  continue 
hy  derivation;  for  it  containeth  in  it  divers  things 
which  apparently  were  not  communicated,  and  which 

NO  MAN  WITHOUT  GROSS  IMPOSTURE  AND  HYPOCRISY 
COULD  CHALLENGE  TO  HIMSELF. 

"  Neither  did  the  apostles  pretend  to  communicate 

it:  they  did  indeed  appoint  standing  pastors  and 
teachers  in  each  church;  they  did  assume  fellow- 
labourers  or  assistants  in  the  work  of  preaching  and 
governance;  but  they  did  not  constitute  apostles  eqnal 
to  themselves  in  authority,  privileges,  or  gifts;  for, 
<who  knoweth  not,'  saith  St.  Austin,  Hhat  principate 
of  apostleship  to  be  preferred  before  any  Episcopa- 
cy?' And,  'The  Bishops,'  saith  Bellarmine,  'have 
no  part  of  the  true  apostolical  authority.'  " 

With  this  conclusion  of  Dr.  Barrow,  agrees  the  cele- 
brated Dodwell,  a  High-Churchman  of  very  exten- 
sive and  profound  erudition,  who  says,  "  The  office 


44  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

of  the  A\)Osi\es  perished  with  the  Apostles;  in  which 
ofHce  there  never  was  any  succession  to  any  of  them, 
EXCEPT  TO  Judas  the  Traitor.'^ 

This  conclusion  is  so  well  fortified  that  tho  idea  of 
controverting  it  is  out  of  the  question.  Aware  of 
this,  Prelatists  insist  upon  taking  the  term  "  Apostle- 
ship"  in  a  modified  sense,  as  the  only  expedient  by 
which  they  can  hope  to  make  out  their  title  to  the 
office.  The  Apostles,  they  tell  M^^ioere  clothed  with 
the  exclusive  jjowers  of  government  and  ordination. 
In  reference  to  these  functions,  their  office  ivas  de- 
signed to  be  perpetual.  And  Episcopal  Bishops  are 
their  true  and  only  successors.  These  three  proposi- 
tions (which  involve,  it  will  be  seen,  a  virtual  abandon- 
ment of  all  claim  to  the  Apostleship,)  comprise  the 
substance  of  their  theory.  Each  of  them  must  be 
established  separately.  For  the  first  does  not  include 
the  others ;  nor  do  the  first  two  include  the  third. 

Before  proceeding  to  the  consideration  of  them,  it 
may  be  proper  to  state  two  or  three  principles  in 
which  Prelatists  and  non-Episcopalians  agree. 

1.  We  agree  that  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  mstituted 
a  Church,  and  appointed  officers  to  minister  in  it. 
2.  We  agree  that  the  Church  was  designed  to  be 
permanent,  and  to  have  permanent  officers.  3.  We 
agree,  (such  at  least  is  the  view  entertained  by  most 
of  the  advocates  for  ministerial  parity,)  that  the 
Apostles  were  in  some  respects  superior  to  other  min- 
isters, and  that  they  were  invested  with  universal 
jurisdiction  over  the  Churches. 

Wherein  we  differ,  shall  be  stated  in  connexion 
with  the  three  propositions  which  comprise  the  pre- 
latic  theory — as  follows  : — 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  45 

1.  "  The  powers  of  ordination  and  jurisdiction 
pertained  exclusively  to  the  Apostleship.'^ 

We  admit  that  these  powers  pertained  in  a  pre- 
eminent degree  to  the  Apostleship;  but  they  were 
also,  we  contend,  exercised  by  Presbyters. 

2.  "The  Apostleship,  in  reference  to  its  preroga- 
tives of  jurisdiction  and  ordination,  was  designed  to 
be  permanent." 

As  ordination  and  jm'isdiction  were  not,  in  our 
view,  functions  pecuhar  to  the  Apostleship,  we  main- 
tain the  perpetuity  of  those  powers  in  the  Church,  and 
yet  deny  the  permanency  of  that  office.  In  respect  to 
their  distinctive  gifts  and  powers  as  Apostles,  they 
were  to  have  no  successors:  in  their  other  powers 
and  functions,  they  were  to  be  succeeded  by  the  ordi- 
nary Ministers  of  the  word,  called  indilferently  in  the 
New  Testament,  Presbyters,  and  Bishops. 

3.  "Episcopal  Bishops  are  the  only  successors  of 
the  Apostles.';^ 

Denying  as  we  do  that  the  Apostles  were  to  have 
successors,  in  the  sense  here  intended,  we  of  course 
deny  that  Episcopal  Bishops  succeeded  them,  or  that 
"the  Episcopal  Bishops''  of  our  day,  can  trace  up 
their  ecclesiastical  genealogy  through  a  line  of  Pre- 
lates to  the  Apostles. 

I  proceed  now  to  examine  these  several  propositions 
in  their  order. — The  first  is,  that  "  the  powers  of 

JUPtlSDICTION    AND     ORDINATION     PERTAINED     EXCLU- 
SIVELY TO  THE  Apostleship." 

This  proposition  is  the  foundation  of  the  High 
Church  theory.  If  they  fail  in  establishing  it,  their 
system  is  subverted :  though  if  they  succeed,  they 
have  still  to  establish  the  other  two  propositions,  which 
are  independent  of  it. 


46  THE    IIIGH-CIIURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

The  theory,  it  will  be  perceived,  is,  that  ordination 
and  government,  are  higher  functions  than  preaching 
the  Gospel,  and  administering  the  sacraments.  The 
difference  between  them  is  so  great,  as  to  mark,  or 
rather  to  demand,  a  diversity  of  rank  in  the  ministry. 
Ordinary  ministers  may  preach  and  administer  the 
sacraments,  but  a  superior  grade  must  be  created  who 
alone  shall  ordain  and  govern.  Now  there  is  ob- 
viously nothing  in  the  nature  of  the  case,  to  suggest 
such  a  distinction.  If  it  is  proper  for  physicians  to  li- 
cense a  physician — for  lawyers  to  license  a  lawyer — 
why  may  not  those,  who  are  authorized  to  preach  the 
Gospel,  and  administer  the  sacraments,  ministerially 
invest  others  with  the  same  office  ?  Bishop  Burnet 
makes  the  administration  of  the  sacraments,  the  high- 
est function  of  the  ministry.  "  Since  the  sacramental 
actions,'^  he  says, "  are  the  highest  of  sacred  perform- 
ances, those  that  are  empowered  for  them,  must  be  of 
the  highest  office  in  the  Church.'^  The  New  Testa- 
ment, in  its  general  tone,  certainly  represents  public 
teaching  and  the  "  sacramental  actions,"  especially  the 
former,  as  the  chief  business  of  the  Christian  ministry. 
If  then,  it  is  alleged  that  these  are  only  secondary  func- 
tions of  the  office,  it  must  be  a  matter  of  positive  insti- 
tution, and  we  demand  clear  scriptural  authority  for  it. 
If  such  authority  cannot  be  produced,  we  shall  hold 
that  the  Prelates  who  in  the  first  instance  wrested  the 
powers  of  jurisdiction  and  ordination  from  presbyters, 
were  guilty  of  a  flagrant  usurpation ;  and  that  any 
monopoly  of  those  powers  by  Prelates,  on  a  pretended 
jure  divino  warrant,  is  in  contravention  of  the  inhe- 
rent rights  of  the  ministry. 

It  happens,  very  unfortunately  for  this  theory,  that 
no  hint  of  it  occurs  in  the  account  of  the  original 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  47 

calling  of  the  Apostles,  nor  in  the  instructions  the 
Saviour  gave  them  upon  that  occasion.  Their  ap- 
pointment is  mentioned  by  three  of  the  Evangehsts, 
and  one  of  them  (see  Matt.  ch.  x.)  records  at  length, 
the  charge  addressed  to  them.  We  have  no  evidence 
from  these  sources  that  the  least  intimation  was  given 
them  of  such  a  diversity  in  their  several  functions  as  is 
now  claimed  to  have  existed.  Nay,  the  "charge'^  is 
mainly  occupied  with  the  subject  of  preachings  and 
does  not  contain  a  syllable,  except  by  implication, 
about  the  higher  duties  of  ordaining  and  governing. 
This  is  a  very  remarkable  omission  on  High-Church 
principles. 

It  will  be  said,  however,  that  the  twelve,  although 
called  at  this  period,  and  employed  in  preaching  dur- 
ing the  Saviour's  ministry,  were  not  clothed  with  the 
plenitude  of  the  Apostleship,  until  after  his  resurrec- 
tion:  and  we  shall  be  referred  to  John  xx.  21 — 23; 
xxi.  15 — 17;  and  to  the  Saviour's  final  command,  in 
proof  that  ordination  and  government,  were  to  be 
restricted  to  the  Apostles.  The  former  of  these  pass- 
ages is  as  follows :  "Then  said  Jesus  unto  them  again, 
Peace  be  unto  you:  as  my  Father  hath  sent  me,  even 
so  send  I  you.  And  when  he  had  said  this,  he  breathed 
on  them  and  saith  unto  them.  Receive  ye  th«  Holy 
Ghost ;  whosesoever  sins  ye  remit,  they  are  remitted 
unto  them ;  and  whosesoever  sins  ye  retain,  they  are 
retained."  The  second  passage  is  that  in  which  the 
Saviour  addresses  the  injunction  to  Peter,  "  Feed 
my  sheep."  The  third  is  the  commission,  "Go  ye 
into  all  the  v/orld,"  &c.  In  the  first  passage,  he  re- 
news their  appointment  as  his  ambassadors  and  re- 
presentatives. Some  will  have  it,  that  in  the  clause, 
"  As  my  Father  hath  sent  me,  even  so  send  I  you," 


48  THE    niGH-CIIURGH    DOCTRINE    OF 

our  Saviour  actually  trcmsfers  his  Headship  over*  the 
Church  to  his  Apostles,  and  delegates  to  them,  in  so 
far  as  the  government  of  the  Church  in  this  world  is 
concerned,  all  the  power  which  He  as  Mediator,  had 
received  from  the  Father.  This  extraordinary  inter- 
pretation, so  derogatory  to  the  Redeemer  and  to  the 
ministry — as  stripping  Him  of  his  crown,  and  making 
them  the  ministers,  not  of  Christ,  but  of  the  Apostles 
— will  be  noticed  in  another  connexion.  For  the  pre- 
sent, it  is  sufficient  to  remark  that  the  language  neither 
denotes  the  perpetuity  of  the  Apostohc  office,  nor 
hints  at  any  distribution  of  their. powers  among  differ- 
ent grades  of  ministers.  It  is  a  simple  declaration,  to 
this  etfect, — that  as  He  had  received  an  immediate 
commission  from  the  Father  for  his  Mediatorial  work, 
so  He  immediately  commissions  them  to  disciple  all 
nations  and  teach  whatever  he  had  commanded.  On 
the  principle  of  the  opposite  interpretation,  it  might 
with  equal  propriety  be  urged  that  when  our  Saviour 
says, (John  xviii.  IS,)  "As  thou  hast  sent  me  into  the 
world,  even  so  have  I  also  sent  them  into  the  world," 
he  means,  that  he  has  transferred  his  authority  and 
headship  to  his  people  severally; — for  it  is  his  jjeo- 
plCy  not  the  ministry  as  such,  who  are  intended  in 
this  verse.  As  an  earnest  of  that  baptism  of  the  Spi- 
rit they  were  about  to  receive  on  the  day  of  Pentecost 
as  well  as  to  show  that  the  blessing  would  be  bestow- 
ed by  Hirriy  He  breathed  on  them  and  said, "  Receive 
ye  the  Holy  Ghost.'^^     He  then  authorized  them  to 

1  Dr.  Scott  has  this  note  on  the  phrase,  "Receive  ye  the  Holy 
Ghost."  "  It  does  not  appear  that  the  Apostles,  on  any  occasion, 
used  these  words.  Peter  and  John  prayed  for  the  disciples  in  Sa- 
maria, that  '  they  might  receive  the  Holy  Ghost.'  .  .  .  '  Then  laid 
they  their  hands  upon  them,  and  they  received  thp  Holy  Ghost.' 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  49 

declare  the  only  method  in  which  sin  would  be  for- 
given, and  the  character  and  experience  of  those  who 
actually  were  pardoned,  or  the  contrary.  Or,  as 
others  interpret  the  words,  he  empowered  them  to  in- 
flict and  remit  Church  censures — in  conformity,  of 
course,  to  the  rules  prescribed  by  himself. — The  in- 
junction, ^*  Feed  my  sheep,"  is  usually  taken  to  in- 
clude the  functions  of  teaching  and  governing  the 
Church. — The  last  command  is  in  these  words,  "Go 
ye,  therefore,  and  teach  all  nations,  baptizing  them  in 
the  name  of  the  Father,  and  of  the  Son,  and  of  the 
Holy  Ghost :  [or,  as  Mark  has  it, '  Go  ye,  into  all 
the  world  and  preach  the  Gospel  to  every  creature :'] 
teaching  them  to  observe  all  things  whatsoever  I  have 
commanded  you  :  and  lo,  I  am  with  you  alway,  even 
unto  the  end  of  the  world.  Amen.'^ 

-Now,  what  evidence  have  we  in  any  or  all  of  these 
passages,  that  ordaining,  and  governing,  were  supe- 
rior functions  to  preaching  and  baptizing  ?  What 
countenance  do  they  give  to  the  doctrine,  that  the 
Apostles  were  to  retain  the  two  former  functions  in 
their  own  hands,  and  share  the  two  others  with  an 
order  of  inferior  ministers  ?     Here,  if  any  where,  we 

(Acts  viii.  15,  17.)  The  language  of  authority  used  by  our  Lord  on 
this  single  occasion,  seems  exclusively  appropriate  to  the  great  Head 
of  the  Church,  and  marks  the  immense  disparity  between  Him  and 
His  most  eminent  servants. — How  far  the  words,  'Receive  ye  the  Holy 
Ghost,'  in  some  of  the  forms  of  our  Church,  is  scriptural  or  warrant- 
able, may  be  worthy  the  consideration  of  all  persons  more  immediately 
concerned  in  the  important  transactions  referred  to."--It  may  b^  add- 
ed, that  the  formula  to  which  these  strictures  relate,  was  not,  as  there 
is  good  reason  to  believe,  used  in  the  ordination  service,  for  upwards  of 
a  thousand  years  after  the  Apostolic  age,  and  that  it  was  first  introduced 
by  the  Romish  Church,  when  her  corruptions  were  nearly  at  their 
height,  and  has  been  borrowed  from  her  by  the  Church  of  England 
and  the  Episcopal  Church  in  this  country. 

5 


50  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

might  expect  this  classification  of  their  powers  to  be 
distinctly  stated.  Especially  might  we  expect  the 
Saviour,  in  his  last  counsels  and  instructions,  to  give 
great  prominence  to  i\\Q  paramount  functions  of  the 
Apostleship,  and  to  the  manner  in  which  these  should 
be  exercised.  The  theory  is — let  it  be  remembered 
— that  the  powers  of  ordination  and  jurisdiction  con- 
stituted   the    DISTINGUISHING  CHARACTERISTIC    of  the 

office,  and  the  sole  ground  for  its  being  perpet- 
uated. They  made  the  Apostleship  what  it  was : 
and  the  only  men  to  be  recognized  as  the  successors 
of  the  Apostles,  were  to  have  that  character  solely 
in  virtue  of  their  possessing  these  powers.  What 
more  natural,  then — what  more  unavoidable — than 
that  the  Saviour,  in  issuing  his  final  directions  to  them, 
should  assign  to  this  topic  the  prominence  so  justly 
due  to  it?  What  more  natural,  than  that  He  should 
at  least  remind  them  in  solemn  terms,  that  the  powers 
of  ordination  and  of  government,  were  confided  to 
them  and  their  successors  in  the  Apostleship  alone, 
while  they  might  share  with  others  the  subordinate 
functions  of  preaching  and  baptizing  ?  What  would 
be  thought  of  the  Federal  Constitution,  if  in  prescribing 
the  duties  of  the  President  of  the  United  States,  it 
merely  hinted  at  his  Executive  powers  ?  Or  what 
would  be  thought  of  a  government,  which  in  sending 
out  an  ambassador,  should  include  in  his  instructions 
only  a  slight  allusion  to  the  most  grave  and  important 
objects  of  his  mission  ?  Not  less  remarkable,  are  the 
omissions  in  the  case  before  us,  if  the  Prelatic  theory  be 
true.  It  is  not  denied  that  the  powers  of  jurisdiction 
and  ordination,  are  by  implication  conveyed  in  these 
passages.  But  it  is  denied  that  they  furnish  the  slight- 
est warrant  for  the  idea,  that  the  powers  just  named 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  51 

are  superior  to  the  other  ministerial  functions,  or  for 
the  doctrine  that  the  Apostles  and  their  successors  were 
to  retain  those  powers,,  and  communicate  these  to  a 
lower  order  of  ministers.  Nay,  it  is  affirmed  with 
confidence,  that  there  is  nothing  even  in  the  record  of 
the  effusion  of  the  Spirit  upon  the  Apostles  on  the  day 
of  Pentecost,  nor  in  the  commission  given  by  our  Sa- 
viour to  Paul,  which  affords  the  least  support  to  this 
hypothesis  of  a  division  in  the  functions  of  the  Apos- 
tleship.  The  only  peculiarity  in  all  these  cases,  is, 
that  a  great  deal  more  is  said  about  preaching,  than 
about  ordaining  or  governing.  It  is  the  burden  of  the 
Saviour's  original  charge  to  the  twelve,  "  Preach  the 
Gospel."  When  he  sends  out  the  seventy,  the  in- 
junction again  is,  "  Preach  the  Gospel."  The  sub- 
stance of  his  parting  command  to  the  Apostles  still  is, 
'^  Preach  the  Gospel."  And  when  another  Apostle 
is  miraculously  called  and  commissioned,  the  great 
work  his  Master  assigns  to  him,  is,  to  "  Preach  the 
Gospel,"  (see  Acts  xxvi.  16 — 18.) — On  our  principles, 
all  this  is  intelligible.  Believing  as  we  do,  that  "  it 
has  pleased  God  by  the  foolishness  of  preaching,  to 
save  them  that  believe,"  we  should  expect  to  see  this 
duty  occupy  the  first  place  in  the  Apostolic  commis- 
sion. But  no  adequate  or  even  plausible  solution  of 
it  has  been  given,  on  their  principles  who  hold  that 
preaching  the  Gospel  is  one  of  the  subordinate  func- 
tions of  the  ministry. 

If  there  is  anything  in  the  nature  of  the  case  to  sug- 
gest a  classification  of  these  powers  in  respect  to  dig- 
nity and  utility,  it  is  by  no  means  clear  that  it  would 
be  the  one  here  contended  for.  Milton  was  not  alone 
in  his  opinion  upon  this  point.  "  The  employment  of 
preaching,"  he  says,  "  is  as  holy  (as  ordination,)  and 


52  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

far  more  excellent ;  the  care,  also,  and  judgment  to 
be  used  in  the  winning  of  souls,  which  is  thought  to 
be  sufficient  in  every  worthy  minister,  is  an  ability 
above  that  which  is  required  in  ordination;  for  many 
may  be  able  to  judge  who  is  fit  to  be  made  a  minister, 
that  would  not  be  found  fit  to  be  made  ministers 
themselves;  as  it  will  not  be  dejaied  that  he  may  be 
the  competent  judge  of  a  neat  picture  or  elegant  poem, 
that  cannot  limn  the  like.  Why,  therefore,  we  should 
constitute  a  superior  order  in  the  Church  to  perform 
an  office  which  is  not  only  every  minister's  function, 
but  inferior  also  to  that  which  he  has  a  confessed 
right  to;  and  why  this  superiority  should  remain  thus 
usurped,  some  wise  Epimenides  tell  us. — Now  for 
jurisdiction,  this  dear  saint  of  the  prelates,  it  will  be 
best  to  consider,  first,  what  it  is.  That  sovereign  Lord, 
who,  in  the  discharge  of  his  holy  anointment  from 
God  the  Father,  which  made  him  Supreme  Bishop  of 
our  souls,  was  so  humble  as  to  say,  '•  Who  made  me 
a  judge  or  a  divider  over  you?"  hath  taught  us  that  a 
churchman's  jurisdiction  is  no  more  but  to  watch  over 
his  flock  in  season  and  out  of  season ;  to  deal  by  sweet 
and  efficacious  instructions,  gentle  admonitions,  and 
sometimes  sounder  reproofs;  against  negligence  or 
obstinacy,  will  be  required  a  rousing  volley  of  pas- 
torly  threatenings;  against  a  persisting  stubbornness, 
or  the  fear  of  a  reprobate  sense,  a  timely  separation 
from  the  flock  by  that  interdictive  sentence,  lest  his  con- 
versation unprohibited  or  unbranded,  might  breathe 
a  pestilential  murrain  into  the  other  sheep.  In  sum, 
his  jurisdiction  is  to  see  to  the  thriving  and  prospering 
of  that  which  he  hath  planted.  What  other  work  the 
Prelates  have  found  for  chancellors  and  suflragans, 
delegates  and  officials,  with  all  the  .  .  rabble  of  sum- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  53 

ners  and  apparitors,  is  but  an  invasion  upon  the  tem- 
poral magistrate,  and  affected  by  them  as  men  that 
are  not  ashamed  of-  the  ensign  and  banner  of  Anti- 
christ. But  true  evangeUcal  jurisdiction  or  discipline, 
is  no  more,  as  was  said,  than  for  a  minister  to  see  to 
the  thriving  and  prospering  of  that  which  he  hath 
planted.  And  which  is  the  worthiest  work  of  these 
two,  to  plant,  as  every  minister's  office  is  equally  with 
the  Bishop's,  or  to  tend  that  which  is  planted,  which 
the  blind  and  undiscerning  prelates  call  jurisdiction, 
and  would  appropriate  to  themselves  as  a  business  of 
higher  dignity?"^ 

Both  the  nature  of  the  case,  then,  and  the  several 
commissions  given  to  the  Apostles,  furnish  a  strong 
presumption  against  the  doctrine  that  two  or  more 
grades  of  ministers  were  to  be  appointed,  the  highest 
of  which  only  should  be  clothed  with  the  powers  of 
jurisdiction  and  ordinatiorL  We  now  affirm  it,  as  a 
matter  of  fact,  that  these  powers  icere  conferred  on 
the  ordinary^  stated  ministers  of  the  ivord,  called 
indifferently  in  the  New  Testament,  Presbyters,  or 
Elders,  and  Bishops. 

Let  it  be  noted  her^  that  Prelatists  now  concede 
that  in  so  far  as  the  scriptural  use  of  the  title  Bishop 
is  concerned,  the  whole  argument  is  in  our  favour. 
They  admit  that  this  title  is  imiformly  employed  in 
the  New  Testament  to  denote  a  Presbyterian  Bishop, 
not~  a  Diocesan  Bishop.  Thus  the  Bishop  of  the 
Diocese  of  Pennsylvania,  in  his  Tract  entitled,  "Epis- 
copacy tested  by  Scripture,"  says,  "The  name 
^Bishop,'  which  now  designates  the  highest  grade  of 
the   Ministry,  is  not   appropriated  to  that   office  in 

•  Animadversions  upon  the  Remonstrant's  Defence,  &c. 

5* 


54  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

Scripture.  That  name  is  there  given  to  the  middle 
order,  or  Presb^^tcrs;  and  all  that  we  read  in  the 
New  Testament  concerning  *  Bishops,'  (including  of 
course  the  words  'overseers'  and  'oversight,'  which 
have  the  same  derivation)  is  to  be  regarded  as  per- 
taining to  that  middle  grade."  This  is  a  very  im- 
portant admission.  It  is  for  Prelatists  to  show  how 
the  highest  grade  of  Ministers  came  to  lay  aside  the 
title,  "Apostles,"  and  to  appropriate  to  themselves  as 
their  exclusive  designation  the  title  of  an  inferior 
order.  If,  as  they  contend,  the  Apostles  were  suc- 
ceeded by  "Apostles,"  why  were  not  their  successors 
styled  Apostles?  If  the  Bishops  of  our  day  are  really 
Apostles,  why  do  they  not  call  themselves  Apostles? 
"It  was  after  the  Apostolic  age,"  says  the  author  of 
the  tract  just  quoted,  (p.  12.)  "that  the  name  'Bishop' 
was  taken  from  the  second  order  and  appropriated  to 
the  j5rst ;  as  we  learn  from  Theodoret,  one  of  the 
fathers." — If  it  had  also  been  stated  that  Theodoret 
lived/our  hundred  years  after  the  Apostles,  unlearned 
readers  of  the  Tract  would  have  known  better  how 
to  estimate  his  authority  on  a  question  of  this  kind. 
But  even  Theodoret  does  not  say  that  Bishops  were 
of  the  same  rank  as  Apostles.  His  language  implies 
the  very  reverse.  His  words  are  as  follows: — "The 
same  persons  were  anciently  called  promiscuously 
both  Bishops  and  Presbyters;  whilst  those  who  are 
now  called  Bishops  were  called  Apostles.  But  shortly 
after  the  name  of  Apostles  was  appropriated  to  such 
only  as  were  Apostles  indeed,  (a>.»7^Qj  hTtoa-eo-Koi^  truly 
Apostles;)  and  then  the  name  Bishop,  was  given  to 
those  who  were  before  called  Apostles."  It  appears 
from  this  that  the  names.  Bishop  and  Presbyter,  were 
originally  used  interchangeably.     This  is  a  point  con- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  55 

ceded,  as  we  have  seen,  by  the  writer  of  the  Tract, 
and  admitted,  it  is  beheved,  by  all  the  EpiscopaHans 
of  the  present  day.  Again ;  it  appears  that  after  the 
Apostolic  age,  the  title,  Apostle,  was  restricted  to 
those  who  were  "Apostles  indeed,^^  or  "truly  Apos- 
tles,'^ that  is,  those  who  had  received  their  commis- 
sions immediately  from  the  Saviour.  This  implies 
that  those  who  now  began  to  appropriate  to  them- 
selves the  exclusive  title  of  "Bishops,"  were  not 
"truly  Apostles."  They  were  regarded  as  of  a  dif- 
ferent rank  from  the  Apostles ;  otherwise  they  would 
have  retained  the  same  title.  They  thought  it  "  not 
decent,"  as  Ambrose  says,  to  assume  that  title.  This 
was  a  confession  of  their  inferiority — an  acknowledg- 
ment that  they  did  not  consider  themselves  as  Apos- 
tles. Jf  they  had  thought  otherwise,  they  must  have 
been  very  different  men  from  some  would-be  Apos- 
tles of  our  day,  to  lay  aside  voluntarily  their  appro- 
priate title  and  take  that  of  an  inferior  order.  It  is 
the  same  as  though  the  Prelates  now  living  should 
put  away -the  title  of  "Bishop,"  and  adopt  that  of 
"Presbyter"  or  "Elder"  exclusively.  Such  an  act 
would  import  that  they  considered  their  true  rank  as 
that  of  Presbyters  only.  So — allowing  Theodoret's 
statement  to  be  correct — the  relinquishment  of  the 
title,  Apostle,  for  that  of  Bishop,  at  a  time  when 
Bishop  and  Presbyter  denoted  one  class  of  offi- 
cers, implied  that  the  parties  concerned  in  it  viewed 
themselves  as  belonging  only  to  the  order  of  Pres- 
byters. We  demand  further  testimony,  however,  than 
has  yet  been  furnished,  that  any  class  of  oiRcers  was 
as  such  designated  by  the  name  Apostles,  after  the 
death  of  the  twelve.  That  the  title  continued  to 
be   used   in  its  general  import  as  synonymous,  or 


56  THE    IIIGH-CHUilCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

nea-rly  so,  with  our  word  ^^  missionaries,'^  is  not  ques- 
tioned. But  the  evidence  is  yet  to  be  adduced  that 
it  was  appropriated  in  its  higher  signification  to  any 
except  "  the  Apostles"  mentioned  in  the  New  Tes- 
tament. The  disappearance  of  the  name  from  the 
early  Church,  shows  that  those  who  lived  in  the  time 
of  the  Apostles  and  immediately  thereafter,  were 
much  less  positive  about  this  doctrine  of  a  perpetual 
succession  of  Apostles,  than  some  who  live  eighteen 
centuries  later. — Not  to  insist  upon  this  point,  how- 
ever, let  us  see  whether  the  Presbyters  and  Bishops  of 
the  New  Testament  churches  were  officers  without 
any  power  of  government  or  discipline. 

These  officers,  let  it  be  remembered,  were  the 
officers  statedly  appointed  by  the  Apostles  in  organ- 
izing churches.  Wherever  a  church  was  established, 
there — as  is  allowed  on  all  hands — one  or  more 
Bishops  or  Presbyters  were,  after  a  suitable  time, 
ordained  as  its  spiritual  overseers.  The  legitimate 
inference  from  this  fact  is,  that  it  was  as  much  their 
business  to  exercise  discipline  as  to  preach  the  Gospel. 
To  invalidate  this  inference,  it  must  be  shown  that 
there  is  at  least  an  antecedent  presumption  that  disci- 
pline was  to  be  lodged  in  other  hands — whereas  the 
presumption  is  all  the  other  way. — Nor  can  it  be  of 
any  avail  to  prove  that  the  Apostles  in  some  few  in- 
stances exercised  discipline  in  churches  provided  with 
Bishops  of  their  own.  For  (1.)  A  general  jurisdiction 
over  the  Church  is  conceded  to  the  Apostles  in  their 
extraordinary  character.  (2.)  The  circumstances  of 
the  cases  in  question  might  have  been  so  peculiar  as 
to  take  them  out  of  the  line  of  ordinary  precedents. 
Nothing,  certainly,  would  appear  more  natural,  in 
the  infancy  of  the  churches  and  while  tlieir  own 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  57 

officers  were  as  yet  inexperienced,  than  that  they 
should  solicit,  wherever  it  was  practicable,  the  aid  of 
an  Apostle  in  difficult  cases  of  discipline.  The  church- 
es composed  of  converted  heathen,  in  the  present  day, 
are  in  this  way  accustomed  to  invoke  the  assistance 
of  the  missionaries  by  whom  they  have  been  planted, 
in  administering  discipline.  (3.)  If  Prelatists  deny  that 
Presbyters  exercised  discipline  in  any  of  the  Apostolic 
churches,  we  demand  the />roq/*of  the  position.  The 
presumption  is  against  them;  and  this  presumption  is 
not  to  be  set  aside  by  adducing  two  or  three  isolated 
examples  of  interposition  on  the  part  of  the  Apostles, 
out  of  perhaps  one  or  two  hundred  churches. 

Even  this  point,  however,  may  be  waived:  for 
there  is  direct  evidence  that  the  power  of  government 
was  committed  to  Presbyters  or  Bishops.  ^ 

There  are  three  terms  employed  in  the  New  Tes- 
tament to  express  the  authority  which  is  to  be  exer- 
cised in  the  Christian  Church,  and  they  are  all  appUed 
to  Presbyters.     These  terms  are, 

1.  fjysoftac — To  take  the  lead. 

2.  rt^ota-frjfio — To  Stand  before — to  preside. 

3.  Ttoifiaivu — To  act  the  part,  to  fulfil  the  duties,  of 
a  Shepherd. 

Every  power  which  Christ  hath  deputed  to  his  offi- 
cers, is  conveyed  by  one  or  other  of  these  terms.  Let 
us  now  turn  to  a  few  passages  in  the  New  Testament. 

Heb.  xiii.  7.  "  Remember  them  which  have  the  rule 
over  you'^  (t-cov  J]you/tfvcov  v.acov,  your  rulers.)  The 
context  shows  that  the  Apostle  is  speaking  of  their 
deceased  Pastors.     Again, 

Verse  17.  "  Obey  them  that  have  the  rule  over  you, 

>  On  this  point  and  some  others  which  follow,  I  have  quoted  freely 
from  Dr.  Mason. 


58  THE    HIGH-CIIURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

(same  word)  for  ihey  watch  for  your  souls  as  they 
that  must  give  account."  It  is  undeniable  that  the 
reference  here  also  is  to  their  ordinary  Pastors,  i.  e.  to 
Presbyters. 

The  general  term  here  used  is  that  employed  in 
Matt.  ii.  6.  "  Thou,  Betiilehem,  in  the  land  of  Juda, 
art  not  the  least  among  the  Princes  (r^ye^oaiv)  of  Juda; 
for  out  of  thee  shall  come  a  Governor  (ryovy-avos)  that 
shall  rule  my  people  Israel." 

1  Tim.  iii.  4.  "  A  Bishop  must  be  one  that  ruleih 
ivell  (rta^wj  Tt^oiataiJLsvov)  his  owu  house."  This  shows 
not  only  the  force  of  the  term,  but  also  that  a  capacity 
to  rule  well  is  an  essential  characteristic  of  a  scrip- 
tural Bishop  or  Presbyter — for  it  is  conceded,  as  we 
have  seen,  that  the  names  Bishop  and  Presbyter,  in 
Scripture,  both  belong  to  ordinary  ministers.  Again, 
1  Tim.  V.  17.  "  Let  the  Elders  that  rule  well  be 
counted  worthy  of  double  honour;  especially  they 
who  labour  in  the  word  and  doctrine."  Not  only  is  the 
power  of  ruling  here  ascribed  to  the  Eldership,  but  it 
is  represented  as  a  less  dignified  and  honourable  func- 
tion than  preaching.  Yet  Presbyters,  we  are  told, 
may  preach,  but  Bishops  only  can  rule !  The  same 
term  occurs  1  Thess.  v.  12.  "  We  beseech  you,  breth- 
ren, to  know  them  which  labour  among  you  and  are 
over  you  in  the  Lord."  As  there  were  several  of  this 
class  of  officers  at  Thessalonica,  they  could  not  have 
been  Diocesan  Bishops,  but  must  have  been  ordinary 
Pastors. 

The  word  ;tot^atra  means,  according  to  the  lexico- 
graphers, not  merely  to  feed,  but  to  govern,  to  take 
care  of,  as  a  shepherd  does  his  flock.  It  is  the  word 
translated  rule  in  Matt.  ii.  6,  already  quoted  :  "  Out 
of  thee  shall  come  a  Governor  that  shall  rule  {rtoiy-avn) 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  59 

my  people  Israel."    This  term,  likewise,  is  applied  to 
Presbyters. 

Acts  XX.  17,  28,  "  From  Miletus,  Paul  sent  to  Ephe- 
sus  and  called  the  Elders  (or  Presbyters)  of  the 
Church,  and  said  unto  them — Take  heed  unto  your- 
selveSiand  to  all  the  flock  over  which  the  Holy  Ghost 
hath  made  you  ovei^seers  (ErciBzoftov?,  Bishops,)  to  feed 
(TioifxaviLv)  the  Church  of  God  which  he  hath  purchased 
with  his  own  blood." 

1  Peter  v.  1 — 4,  "  The  Elders  (Presbyters)  which 
are  among  you  I  exhort,  who  am  also  an  Elder 
(Presbyter,)  and  a  witness  of  the  sufferings  of  Christ. 
Feed  (noifiavatt)  the  flock  of  God  which  is  am.ong  you, 
taking  the  oversight  {fnicxoTtovvifB^,  discharging  the 
duty  of  Bishops)  thereof,  not  by  constraint  but  wil- 
lingly, not  for  filthy  lucre,  but  of  a  ready  mind ; 
neither  as  being  lords  over  God's  heritage,  but  being 
ensamples  to  the  flock.  And  when  the  chief  Shepherd 
shall  appear,  ye  shall  receive  a  crown  of  glory  that 
fadeth  not  away." 

"By  instructing  Presbyters,  in  this  passage,  hoio 
they  were  to  govern  the  Church,  the  Apostle  (himself 
a  '  Presbyter')  has  decided  that  the  poiver  of  g over n- 
ment  \YdiS  committed  to  them.  No  higher  authority 
than  he  has  recognized  in  them,  can  belong  to  the 

order  of  Prelates The  term  which  both  Paul  and 

Peter  apply  to  the  cffRce  of  Presbyters,  undoubtedly 
expresses  the  power  of  government;  seeing  it  is  the 
term  which  expresses  the  office  of  Christ,  as  the 
Governor  of  his  people  Israel,  (Matt.  ii.  6,  quoted 
above.)  And  as  this  term,  applied  to  the  office  of 
Christ,  expresses  the  highest  power  of  government  in 
him  as  the  chief  Shepherd;  so  when  applied  to  the 
office  of  the  under-shepherds,  it  expresses  the  highest 


60  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

power  of  government  which  he  has  delegated  to  be 
exercised  in  his  name  for  the  welfare  of  his  Church. 
But  this  power  is  vested,  Paul  and  Peter  being  judges, 
in  Presbyter's;  therefore  Presbyters,  by  the  appoint- 
ment of  Jesus  Christ,  are  invested  with  the  highest 
power  of  government  known  in  his  Church^^^  It 
may  be  added,  in  confirmation  of  tliis  view,  that  by 
calUng  himself  ovtine^^aevti^oi  (a  fellow-presbyter)  he 
seems  to  intimate  that  they  (/.  e.  Presbyters)  possessed 
all  the  authority  in  the  Christian  Church  which  was 
to  remain  after  the  death  of  the  Apostles:  and  the 
introduction  of  the  a^xiTtoiixriv  (or  chief  Shepherd)  ap- 
pears inconsistent  with  the  idea  of  the  it^^aQv-ti^ot 
(Presbyters)  being  accountable  to  any  individual 
teacher,  after  the  Apostles  ceased  to  represent  the 
authority  of  the  chief  Shepherd  upon  earth. 

Thus  much  for  the  claim  of  Presbyters  to  the  power 
oi jurisdiction.  Let  us  next  inquire  whether  they  had 
the  right  of  ordination. 

Here,  as  in  the  former  case,  the  burden  of  proof 
properly  lies  upon  the  Prelatists.  There  is  nothing  in 
tlie  nature  of  the  case  to  denote  that  ordination  is  a 
higher  function  than  preaching  and  administering  the 
sacraments.  Nor  is  there  (as  has  been  shown)  any 
intimation  in  the  Apostolic  commission,  that  those 
who  were  to  be  appointed  as  Overseers  or  Bishops  iu 
the  churches,  should  be  prohibited  from  ordaining. 
But  we  need  not  rest  the  case  here. 

'^  In  the  first  primitive  Church,"  says  the  learned 
Stilhngfleet,^  "  the  Presbyters  all  acted  iu  common  for 

•  Irenicum,  ch.  vi.  p.  298.  As  I  shall  have  further  occasion  to 
quote  from  the  "  Irenicum,"  it  may  be  well  to  introduce  here  the  fol- 
lowing statement  from  the  Rev.  Dr.  Miller's  "Letters  on  the  Chris- 
tian  Ministry,"  8vo.  ed.  p.  173. 

"  To  destroy  the  force  of  Dr.  StiUingfleet's  concessions,  it  is  urged 


OF    THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  61 

the  welfare  of  the  Church,  and  either  did  or  might 
ordain  others  to  the  same  autfiority  loith  themselves ; 
because  the  iritrinsical  power  of  order  is  equally  in 
them,  and  in  those  who  were  after  appointed  govern- 
ors over  Presbyteries.  And  the  collation  of  orders 
doth  come  from  the  power  of  order,  and  not  merely 
from  the  power  of  jurisdiction.  It  being  likewise  fully 
acknowledged  by  the  schoolmen,  that  Bishops  are  not 
superior  above  Presbyters,  as  to  the  power  of  order." 
If  this  view  can  be  substantiated  by  the  production  of 
a  sohtary  example  of  ordination  by  Presbyters  in  the 
Apostolic  Church,  the  whole  High-Church  theory  is 
prostrated — as  they  themselves  admit. 

Of  the  few  instances  of  ordination  described  in  the 
New  Testament,  I  shall  examine  only  two.  The  first 
of  these  is  recorded  in  Acts  xiii.  1 — 3.  "  Now  there 
were  in  the  Church  that  was  at  Antioch  certain  pro- 
phets and   teachers;  as  Barnabas  and  Simeon  that 

that  he  afterwards  became  dissatisfied  with  this  work,  and  retracted 
the  leading  opinion  which  it  maintains  [that  is,  that  no  one  form  of 
church  government  is  exclusively  prescribed  in  the  word  of  God.] 
To  this  suggestion  I  will  reply  by  a  quotation  from  Bishop  White^ 
of  Pennsylvania,  who  in  a  pamphlet  published  a  few  years  since,  hav- 
ing occasion  to  adduce  the  '  Irenicum'  as  an  authority  against  High 
Church  notions,  speaks  of  the  performance  and  its  author  in  the  fol- 
lowing terms :  '  As  that  learned  prelate  was  afterwards  dissatisfied 
with  his  work,  (though  most  probably  not  with  that  part  of  it  which 
would  have  been  to  our  purpose,)  it  might  seem  uncandid  to  cite  the 
authority  of  his  opinion.  Bishop  Burnet,  his  cotemporary  and  friend, 
says,  {History  of  his  Own  Times,  anno  1661,)  '  To  avoid  the  imputa- 
tion that  book  brought  on  him,  he  went  into  the  humours  of  an  high 
sort  of  people,  beyond  what  became  him,  perhaps  beyond  his  own 
sense  of  things.'  *  The  book,  however,'  Bishop  White  adds,  •  was,  it 
seems,  easier  retracted  than  refuted  ;  for  though  oflfensive  to  many  of 
both  parties,  it  was  managed  (says  the  same  author)  with  so  much 
learning  and  skill,  that  none  of  either  side  ever  undertook  to  answer 
it.'  " 


62  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

Avas  called  Niger,  and  Lucius  of  Cyrcne,  and  Manacn, 
which  had  been  brought  up  with  Herod  the  tetrarch, 
and  Saul.  As  they  ministered  to  the  Lord,  and  fasted, 
the  Holy  Ghost  said,  Separate  me  Barnabas  and  Saul 
for  the  work  whereunto  I  have  called  them.  And 
when  they  had  fasted  and  prayed,  and  laid  their  hands 
on  them,  they  sent  them  away.'^ 

Many  eminent  Episcopalians,  including  Mr.  Pal- 
mer, in  his  treatise  on  the  Church,  Whateley,  Wake^ 
Potter,  Jeremy  Taylor,  Beveridge,  Hooker,  Dr.  Pusey, 
and  others,!  have  held  that  this  was  a  case  of  ordi- 
nation. The  ordainers  were  "  prophets  and  teach- 
ers." Teachers  were  ordinary  Presbyters :  and  the 
same  individuals  might  be  both  teachers  and  pro- 
phets. The  titles  are  not  supposed  to  denote  so  much 
a  difference  of  rank  as  a  difference  of  endowments 
and  functions :  but  they  both  ranked  below  Apos- 
tles. If,  then,  this  was  an  ordination,  it  was  performed 
by  PreshyterSy  not  by  Apostles. 

Others,  however,  regard  this  transaction,  and,  as  the 
writer  thinks,  with  more  reason,  not  as  an  ordination, 
but  as  the  solemn  designation  of  Saul  and  Barnabas,  to 
a  specific  and  temporary  mission.  On  this  view,  the 
transaction  was  but  one  remove  from  an  ordination, 
and  is  not  easily  to  be  explained  on  prelatical  princi- 
ples. For  how  does  it  comport  with  those  principles, 
that  Presbyters  should  "lay  their  hands"  upon  the 
head  of  an  Apostle  ?  Is  there  a  High-Church  Bishop 
to  be  found,  the  world  over,  who  would  allow  a  com- 
pany of  his  Presbyters  to  set  him  apart  in  this  way  to 
a  missionary  or  any  other  undertaking  ?  There  are 
some  amonar  them  to  whom  the  bare  sus^sestion  of 
such  a  thing  would  probably  appear  sacrilegious. 
To   Presbyterians,  however,  the   whole  transaction 

1  See  Dr.  Smyth. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  63 

is  perfectly  natural  and  canonical.  And  the  conclu- 
sion we  draw  from  it,  is,  that  if  Presb^^ters  might  law- 
fully set  apart  an  Apostle  to  a  specific  work,  on  so 
solemn  an  occasion  as  this,  it  will  be  difficult  to  show 
that' they  have  no  right  to  officiate  in  an  actual  ordi- 
nation. 

The  other  instance  referred  to,  is  that  of  Timothy. 
This  is  mentioned  by  the  Apostle,  in  addressing  him, 
in  the  following  terms:  "  Neglect  not  the  gift  that  is 
in  thee,  which  was  given  thee  by  prophecy,  with  the 
laying  on  of  the  hands  of  the  Presbytery. ^^  1  Tim. 
iv.  14.  To  this  verse  may  be  added  another  from  the 
second  Epistle,  (ch.  i.  6.)  "Wherefore  I  put  thee  in 
remembrance  that  thou  stir  up  the  gift  of  God  which 
is  in  thee,  by  the  putting  on  of  my  hands.^^ 

There  are  few  verses  in  the  Bible  which  have 
given  Prelatists  more  perplexity  than  the  former  of 
these.  All  that  learning,  ingenuity,  and  zeal  could 
do,  has  been  done,  to  make  it  say  something  else  than 
that  Timothy  was  ordained  by  a  Presbytery.  It  is 
a  fundamental  principle  of  Prelacy,  that  Presbyters 
cannot  ordain.  If  Timothy  was  ordained  by  Pres- 
byters, or  by  a  Presbyter3^,  this  principle  is  subverted, 
and  the  whole  imposing  superstructure  built  upon  it, 
is  overthrown.  Hence  the  solicitude  to  silence  the 
clear,  straightforward  testimony  of  this  passage,  to 
the  groundlessness  of  their  assumptions. 

There  are  strong  reasons  for  doubting  whether  the 
verse  quoted  from  the  second  Epistle,  refers  to  Timo- 
thy's ordination  at  all.  Miraculous  gifts  were  usu- 
ally imparted  by  the  imposition  of  the  hands  of  the 
Apostles,  and  this  seems  to  be  intended  by  the  Apostle 
when  he  exhorts  Timothy  to  "  stir  up  the  gift  that  is 
in  him  by  the  putting  on  of  his  hands."    The  context 


64  THE    HIGH-CIIURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

also  favours  this  interpretation;  and  it  has  the  sanc- 
tion of  many  eminent  critics,  and  of  a  number  of  dis- 
tinguished Episcopal  writers.  I  waive  the  question, 
however,  for  the  present. 

Among  the  expedients  reUed  upon  to  destroy  tlie 
authority  of  the  other  passage,  as  a  warrant  for  Pres- 
byterial  ordination,  the  following  are  the  principal. 

1.  It  is  contended  that  the  word  fi^eGSvtT^^iov,  trans- 
lated Presbytery,  denotes  not  the  persons  who  or- 
dained Timothy,  but  the  office  to  which  he  was 
ordained :  so  that  the  passage  should  read,  "  Neglect 
not  the  gift  that  is  in  thee,  even  the  Preshyterate, 
which  was  given  thee  with  the  laying  on  of  hands." 
And  Calvin's  name  is  quoted  in  support  of  this  inter- 
pretation.    On  this  construction,  I  observe, 

(1.)  That  the  established,  habitual  meaning  of  the 
term  as  used  in  the  Scriptures,  is,  an  assemblage, 
council,  or  senate  of  Presbyters.  (2.)  That  this  is  its 
true  import  in  the  place  under  consideration  is  allowed 
by  a  great  body  of  learned  Episcopal  writers.  It  will 
be  suflicient  to  mention  Beveridge,  Saravia,  Lord  Bar- 
rington,  and  Dr.  Bloomfield,  who,  in  his  Critical 
Digest,  says,  "  I  camiot  agree  with  Benson,  that  the 
Elders  did  not  confer  this  gift.  They,  it  should  seem, 
contributed  to  confer  it."  (3.)  As  to  Calvin,  he 
admits  that  the  word  will  hear  the  interpretation 
mentioned  above,  but  declares,  that  "  in  his  judg- 
ment, those  who  think  Presbytery  to  be  a  collec- 
tive noun,  put  for  the  college  of  Presbyters,  think 
rightly."  (4.)  This  interpretation,  even  if  admitted, 
goes  to  overthrow  the  Prelatic  doctrine.  For  on 
this  construction,  Timothy  was  ordained  to  the  Pres- 
hyterate,  i.  e.  to  the  office  of  a  Presbyter — as  we 
maintain.     And  we  call  for  the  evidence   that  he 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  65 

received  any  subsequent  ordination  to  the  Prelacy  or 
t/lpostleship.  1 

2.  A  second  interpretation  which  it  is  sought  to 
force  upon  this  text,  is,  that  by  the  "  Presbytery"  tliat 
laid  hands  upon  Timothy,  is  to  be  understood  a  coun- 
cil of  Jipostles. — On  this  I  remark,  (1.)  That  it  does 
great  violence  to  the  language  of  the  Apostle.  The 
word  Presbytery  denotes  not  a  council  of  JlpostUs, 
but  a  council  of  Presbyters.  (2.)  This  construction 
assumes  the  whole  point  in  debate.  We  deny  and 
Prelatists  affirm,  that  ordination  could  be  performed 
only  by  Apostles.  We  produce  a  passage  in  which 
it  is  asserted  that  a  certain  ordination  was  performed 
by  a  Presbytery.  And  hereupon  they  claim,  without 
proof  and  against  the  natural,  legitimate  import  of  the 

'term,  and  the  usus  loquendl  of  the  Scriptures,  that 
this  Presbytery  was  a  college  of  Apostles.  (3.)  If  this 
Presbytery  was  composed  of  Apostles,  how  could 
Paul  say  (as  they  maintain  he  does  say)  that  he  alone 
ordained  Timothy — "iy  the  putting  on  of  my 
hands V^  For  they  argue,  as  we  shall  see  presently, 
that  Paul  was  the  ordainer,  and  the  Presbytery  laid 
on  hands  merely  to  express  their  concurrence  in  the 
act.  Was  it  seemly  in  Paul  to  claim  all  the  elTicacy 
and  honour  of  the  ordination  as  his  own,  when  seve- 
ral of  his  fellow- Apostles  united  with  him  in  the  lay- 
ing on  of  hands?    Thus  much  for  the  second  evasion. 

3.  The  third  has  been  hinted  at.  It  is  maintained 
that  Paul  alone  ordained  Timothy,  and  that  the  Pres- 
bytery only  laid  on  their  hands,  to  signify  their  appro- 
bation of  tlie  act.     In  support  of  this  view,  we  are 

•  We  iniglit  extend  this  call  and  ask  for  the  production  of  a  single 
instance  from  the  New  Testament,  of  the  ordination  of  a  minister  by 
piece-meal. 

6* 


66  THE    IIIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

told  that  in  speaking  of  his  own  part  in  the  transac- 
tion, the  Apostle  uses  the  preposition  6ta,  signifying 
the  cause  of  a  thing, — "which  is  in  thee  (§ia)  bi/  the 
putting  on  of  my  hands," — and  that  in  speaking  of  the 
agency  of  the  Presbytery,  he  uses  another  preposition 
fifta,  denoting  merely  "  nearness,  concurrence,  agree- 
ment''— "which  was  given  thee  by  prophecy  {^wta) 
with  the  laying  on  of  the  hands  of  the  Presbytery." 

The  obvious  answer  to  this,  is,  that  the  prepositions 
in  question  are  frequently  used  interchangeably;  and 
that  ixB-^a  with  a  genitive  often  signifies  bi/,  or  bi/ 
means  of.  A  single  example  will  suffice.  In  Acts 
ii.  43,  we  read  that  "  many  signs  and  wonders  were 
done  by  (Sia)  the  Apostles."  While  in  Acts  xv.  4, 
we  are  told  that  Barnabas  and  Paul  "  rehearsed  all 
things  that  God  had  done  with  {^std)  them."  Here" 
the  prepositions  are  synonymous,  and  both  signify  the 
instrumental  cause.  We  reject  the  criticism,  there- 
fore, and  with  it  the  doctrine  it  is  brought  to  establish, 
that  the  Presbytery  united  with  the  Apostle  in  the 
imposition  of  hands  only  to  express  their  approbation 
of  the  act. 

Allowing  that  the  two  passages  involved  in  this 
controversy  both  relate  to  Timothy's  ordination,  he 
Avas  ordained  by  a  Presbytery  in  which  Paul  jjre- 
sided;  the  President,  or,  as  we  would  style  him^ 
the  Moderator,  and  the  other  members,  uniting  in 
the  imposition  of  hands.  The  outward  act  was  the 
same  precisely  on  their  part  as  on  his;  and  the  evi- 
dence is  yet  to  be  adduced  that  the  laying  on  o-f  Paul's 
hands  signified  one  thing,  and  the  laying  on  of  their 
hands  signified  something  else.  It  is  a  palpable  con- 
fession of  the  weakness  cA  a  cause,  when  such  argu- 
ments are  resorted  to  to  sustain  it. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  67 

Having  thus  exposed  the  fallaey  of  the  various 
expedients  employed  by  Prelatists  to  ehide  the  fair 
import  of  the  verses  we  have  been  examining,  we 
affirm  with  confidence  that  Timothy's  ordination  was 
a.  Presbyterial  ordination.  This  view,  it  may  be 
added,  has  been  vindicated  by  eminent  Episcopahans, 
among  whom  it  will  be  sufficient  to  name  the  learned 
Dr.  Whitaker,  regius  professor  of  theology  at  Cam- 
bridge, a  man  of  whom  the  pious  Bishop  Hall  said, 
"  No  man  ever  saw  him  without  reverence,  or  heard 
him  without  wonder."  "This  place,"  says  Whitaker, 
(referring  to  1  Tim.  iv.  14,)  in  arguing  with  Car- 
dinal Bellarmine,  "  serves  our  purpose  mightily;  for 
from  hence  we  understand,  that  Timothy  had  hands 
laid  upon  him  by  Presbyters,  ivho  at  that  time  go- 
verned the  Church  by  a  common  council.^^  "  Where- 
upon," adds  Dr.  Calamy,  from  whom  I  quote,  "  he 
falls  upon  Bellarmine  and  the  Romanists,  for  deny- 
ing the  authority  of  ordaining  to  Presbyters  and  con- 
iining  it  to  Bishops.  If  this  was  right  doctrine  in  the 
Church  of  England  in  his  days,  we  are  certainly  much 
altered  since."  Dr.  C's  closing  remark  is  too  good  to 
be  omitted.  "  Though  some  are  unwilling  to  allow 
of  any  inference  drawn  from  hence  in  favour  of  Pres- 
byters, yet  had  it  been  expressed  accommodately  to 
their  mind;  had  the  Apostle  said,  'Neglect  not  the 
gift  that  is  in  thee,  which  was  given  thee  by  prophecy 
with  the  laying  on  of  the  hands  of  the  Ejnscopate ;^ 
we  have  little  reason  to  question  but  that  they  would 
triumphantly  have  concluded  thence  for  the  appro- 
priating ordination  to  Bishops,  and  have  warmly 
inveighed  against  us,  should  we  have  offered  to  dis- 
pute it."» 

»  Calamy's  Defence  of  Mod.  Non-Conf.  i.  83. 


68  THE    HIGH-CIIURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

This  case  is  conclusive  as  to  the  point  that  the 
right  of  ordination  belonged  as  ivell  to  Presbyters  as 
Apostles.  It  also  settles  another  point  of  great  im- 
portance in  this  controversy,  viz.  that  Timothy  was 
ordained  a  Presbyter,  not  a  Prelate.  For  he  was 
ordained,  as  has  been  proved,  by  Presbyters.  Of 
course,  on  High-Church  principles,  he  could  only  have 
been  ordained  a  Presbyter.  If,  however,  it  is  con- 
tended that  he  was  ordained  an  Ajiostle,  it  follows 
that  Apostles  and  Presbyters  were  really  of  one  order 
— for  on  no  other  principle  could  Presbyters  ordain 
an  Apostle.     Either  conclusion  is  fatal  to   Prelacy. 

This  is  not  the  place  to  inquire  how  the  right  of 
Presbyters  to  ordain  ever  came  to  be  denied.  It  may 
be  well  to  state,  however,  that  according  to  the  emi- 
nent German  Historian,  Planck,  that  right  "was  never 
called  in  question  until  the  Bishops  began,  about  the 
middle  of  the  third  century,  to  assert  the  doctrine  of 
the  Apostolical  Succession.  With  the  name  it  seemed 
desirable  also  to  inherit  the  authority  of  the  Apostles. 
For  this  purpose  they  availed  themselves  of  the  right 
of  ordination.  The  right  of  ordination,  of  course, 
devolved  exclusively  upon  the  Bishops,  as  alone  com- 
petent rightly  to  administer  it.  As  they  had  been 
duly  constituted  the  successors  of  the  Apostles,  so  also 
had  they  alone  the  right  to  communicate  the  same  in 
part  or  fully,  by  the  imposition  of  hands.  From  this 
time  onward,  to  give  the  rite  more  effect,-  it  was 
administered  with  more  imposing  solemnity."  ^ 

We  have  now  finished  our  examination  of  the  first 
position  which  must  be  established  in  order  to  make 

1  Cited  by  Mr.  Coleman  in  his  interesting  work  on  the  "  Primitive 
Church,"  wliicli  has  appeared  while  these  sheets  are  passing  through 
the  press. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  69 

out  the  High-Church  theory,  to  wit:  that  "  the  powers 
of  government  and  ordination  pertained  exclusively 
to  the  ^postleshipJ^  Clear  and  decisive  scriptural 
authorities  have  been  adduced  to  show  that  both  these 
powers  were  shared  by  Presbyters.  The  tesult  of 
this  inquiry  is  destructive  to  the  High-Church  doctrine 
of  the  ^Apostolical  Succession.  That  doctrine  is,  that 
the  Apostolic  order  was  to  be  perpetuated,  because 
Apostles  alone  could  exercise  the  functions  of  ordi- 
nation and  government.  The  office  being  shorn  of 
the  exclusive  possession  of  these  powers,  the  alleged 
necessity  for  its  being  perpetuated,  ceases.  The  pow- 
ers in  question  having  been  proved  to  belong  to 
Presbyters,  a  succession  of  Presbyters  is  the  only 
Ministerial  succession  the  Church  requires,  and  (as 
we  maintain)  the  only  one  asserted  in  the  Scrip- 
tures. 

The  second  position  it  is  incumbent  on  High- 
Churchmen  to  establish,  was  stated  in  these  words  : — 
"  The  Apostleship,  in  reference  to  its  prerog- 
atives OF  ordination  and  government,  was  de- 
signed to  be  permanent." 

This  position  assumes  the  truth  of  the  first,  viz. 
that  ordination  and  government,  were  exclusive  attri- 
butes of  the  Apostleship.  This  having  been  disproved, 
the  position  built  upon  it  falls  to  the  ground.  It  may 
be  satisfactory,  however,  to  notice  a  few  of  the  argu- 
ments relied  upon  to  prove  that  the  Apostolic  office 
was  designed  to  be  perpetuated. 

Dr.  Pusey  and  some  of  his  associates  frankly  admit, 
as  we  have  seen,  not  only  that  there  is  no  passage  of 
Scripture  which  affirms  in  so  many  words  that  this 
office  was  to  be  permanent,  but  that  the  Bible  fur- 
nishes no  clear  and  satisfactory  warrant  for  the  system 
of  which  this  doctrine  is  so  radical  a  feature.     Other 


70  THE    HIGH-CIIURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

High-Churchmeu  profess  to  find  a  warrant  for  the 
perpetuity  of  the  Apostleship,in  the  promise  annexed 
to  the  Saviour's  last  command — "  Lo,  I  am  with  you 
always,  even  unto  the  end  of  the  world."  It  is,  how- 
ever, a  mere  begging  of  the  question  to  assume  that 
this  was  designed  exclusively  for  "Apostles."  The 
common  interpretation  is  that  it  was  intended  both  for 
the  Church,  that  is,  the  true  Israel  of  God,  and  for 
such  a  ministry  as  the  commission  itself  describes,  viz. 
a  ministry  who  should  "preach  the  Gospel."  The 
promise  can  belong  only  to  such  ministers  as  comply 
with  the  condition  on  which  it  is  suspended.  But 
this  has  not  usually  been  done  by  those  who  claim  to 
be  the  "successors  of  the  Apostles."  A  large  propor- 
tion of  them  have  not  been  statedly  engaged  in 
"  preaching ;"  and  of  those  who  have  preached  with 
more  or  less  frequency,  very  many  have  preached 
any  thing  beside  the  pure  "  Gospel"  of  Christ.  High- 
Churchmen  must  admit  this ;  for  they  know  too  well 
the  character  of  the  great  mass  of  the  Romish  prelates 
for  ages  together,  to  say  nothing  of  the  Bishops  of  any 
other  Churches,  to  call  it  in  question.'  The  promise, 
then,  cannot  be  restricted  to  "  Apostles"  or  prelates ; 
and  it  gives  no  countenance  to  the  idea  that  the  Apos- 
tolic office  was  to  be  a  permanent  office  in  the  Church.^ 
The  appointment  of  Matthias  and  Paul  to  the 
Apostleship,  has  been  urged  as  a  proof  that  the  office 
was  designed  to  be  perpetuated.  The  fact  is  admitted, 
but  the  inference  reversed.  We  draw  from  these 
cases  an  argument  to  show  that  the  office  was  extra- 

1  The  same  train  of  reasoning  which  would  restrict  the  promise, 
"  Lo,  I  am  with  you  always,"  to  the  Apostles,  would  prove  that 
they  alone  were  to  partake  of  the  Lord's  Supper.  For  if  that  pro- 
mise was  immediately  addressed  to  the  Apostles  only,  so  also  was 
the  command,  "  This  do  in  remembrance  of  me." 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  71 

ordinary  and  temporary.  Peter  lays  it  down,  on  the 
occasion  of  JNIatthias^  appointment  (see  Acts  i.  15 — 
26)  to  fill  the  place  of  Jndas,  that  an  individual  must 
be  selected  who  could  be,  with  the  eleven,  a  ivitness 
of  the  Saviour's  resurrection.  This  was  an  essential 
qualification  for  the  Apostleship,  and  it  was  one 
Matthias  possessed.  Then,  in  the  second  place,  like 
all  the  other  Apostles,  he  received  what  may,  under 
the  circumstances  be  fairly  regarded  as  an  immediate 
desigJiation  to  the  office  from  heaven:  for  he  was 
chosen  by  lot,  after  a  solemn  appeal  to  God. 

Paul  was  not  called  to  the  Apostleship  until  several 
years  after  the  Saviour's  ascension.  Yet  even  in  his 
case  an  immediate  vocation,  and  a  sight  of  the  Sa- 
viour, to  enable  him  to  bear  witness  to  the  fact  of  his 
resurrection,  were  recognized  as  indispensable  requi- 
sites to  the  office.  Ananias  says  to  him,  ''  The  God 
of  our  fathers  hath  chosen  thee  that  thou  shouldest 
know  his  will,  and  see  that  Just  One,  and  shouldest 
hear  the  words  of  his  mouth."  Paul  himself  men- 
tions this  fact  in  proof  his  Apostleship,  1  Cor.  ix.  I,  2. 
*'Am  I  not  an.^/?05//e.?  Am  I  not  free?  Have  I  not 
seen  Jesus  Christ  our  Lord?''  And  in  his  speech 
before  Agrippa,  Acts  xxvi.  16,  he  quotes  the  words 
addressed  to  him  by  Christ  in  his  original  commission : 
"  I  have  appeared  unto  thee  for  this  purpose,  to  make 
thee  a  Minister,  and  a  Witness  both  of  these  things 
which  thou  hast  seen  and  of  those  things  in  the  which 
I  will  appear  unto  thee." 

Here,  then,  we  have  the  only  clear  and  indisputa- 
ble instances  of  appointments  to  the  Apostleship,  after 
the  Saviour's  resurrection.  ^    Do  these  examples  coun- 

1  There  is  a  difference  of  opinion  respecting  the  Apostleship  of 
Barnabas.    Many  Prelatists  and  others  hold  that  he  was  an  Apostle 


72  THE    HIGH-CHURCII    DOCTRINE    OF 

tenance  the  idea  that  the  Apostleship  was  to  be  an 
ordinary,  standing  office  in  the  Church?  So  far  from 
it,  the  clear  implication  from  the  facts  in  each  case,  is, 
that  the  office  was  not  to  be  perpetuated.  For  these 
facts  show  that  no  one  could  be  an  Apostle  unless  he 
had  SEEN  Christ,  and  received  his  appointment  to  the 
Apostleship  by  an  immediate  designation  from  heaven. 
And  as  these  qualifications  will  not  be  claimed  for 
those  who  are  alleged  to  have  been  in  the  succession 
since  that  period,  not  only  must  the  argument  drawn 
from  the  cases  of  Matthias  and  Paul  in  favour  of  the 
prelatical  theory  be  given  up,  but  we  must  be  allowed 
to  plead  these  cases  as  furnishing  a  strong  argument 
against  it. 

The  next  witnesses  brought  forward  to  prove  that 
the  Apostles  were  to  have  successors,  are  Timothy 
and  Titus.  It  is  alleged  that  these  ministers  were 
Diocesan  Bishops,  or,  as  the  argument  runs  now-a- 
days.  Apostles,  the  former  of  Ephesus,  and  the  latter 
of  Crete.  The  argument  is  in  this  form.  The  Apos- 
tles alone  possessed  the  powers  of  jurisdiction  and 

in  the  liigher  sense,  and  was  ordained  to  that  office  on  the  occasion 
mentioned  Acts  xiii.  1-3.  There  are  serious  objections  to  that  view, 
but  they  need  not  be  stated  here.  It  is  rejected,  among  others,  by 
Bishop  II.  U.  Onderdonk,  in  his  Tract  already  quoted,  who  maintains 
that  Barnabas  was  an  Apostle  prior  to  the  transaction  referred  to.  If 
this  was  the  case,  we  have  no  record  whatever  of  his  call  to  the  office. 
In  the  absence  of  all  testimony,  it  cannot,  obviously,  be  assumed  that 
he  was  made  an  Apostle  without  being  qualified  to  bear  witness  to 
the  Saviour's  resurrection,  or  in  any  other  mode  than  by  a  direct 
vocation  from  heaven.  If  he  was  an  Apostle,  it  is  fair  to  presume 
that  the  same  conditions  were  fulfilled  in  his  case  which  we  hnow 
were  fulfilled  in  that  of  each  of  the  others. — Most  persons,  however, 
will  probably  conclude,  after  a  careful  examination  of  his  history,  that 
the  title.  Apostle,  is  given  him  in  the  New  Testament  only  in  its 
secondary  import. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  73 

ordination.  But  these  powers  were  exercised  by- 
Timothy  and  Titus.  Therefore  Timothy  and  Titus 
were  Apostles. 

The  major  proposition  of  this  syllogism,  it  will  be 
seen,  involves  a  petitio  principii.  It  assumes  the 
point  in  debate,  viz.  that  government  and  ordination 
were  exclusive  attributes  of  the  Apostles — a  doctrine 
already  examined  and  disproved. 

However,  we  admit  that  the  Apostles  exercised  a 
general  jurisdiction  over  the  whole  Church,  and  over 
ministers  as  well  as  congregations.  This  power  is 
claimed  for  Timothy  and  Titus,  in  regard  to  the 
churches  and  ministers  respectively  of  Ephesus  and 
Crete.  To  the  former,  Paul  says,  "  I  besought  thee 
still  to  abide  at  Ephesus,  that  thou  mightest  charge 
some  that  they  teach  no  other  doctrine."  He  specifies 
the  qualifications  of  Bishops  or  Presbyters,  and  Dea- 
cons— directs  him  to  "  lay  hands  suddenly  on  no  man" 
— and  "  against  an  elder,  to  receive  not  an  accusation, 
but  before  two  or  three  witnesses."  To  Tiius,  the 
Apostle  says,  "  For  this  cause  left  I  thee  in  Crete,  that 
thou  shouldest  set  in  order  the  things  that  are  want- 
ing, and  ordain  elders  in  every  city."  He  tells  him 
further,  "  A  man  that  is  an  heretic,  after  the  first  and 
second  admonition  reject;"  and,  as  in  writing  to 
Timothy,  he  prescribes  the  proper  qualifications  of 
Bishops  or  Presbyters* 

These  are  the  principal  passages  relied  upon  to 
sustain  the  Prelatic  doctrine.  They  teach,  we  are 
told,  the  superiority  of  Timothy  and  Titus  to  the 
other  ministers  of  Ephesus  and  Crete;  and  thereby 
establish  the  position  that  there  was  to  be  di  perma- 
nent order  of  ministers  in  the  Church,  superior  to 
Presbyters. 

7 


74  THE    HIGII-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

Our  High-Church  friends  find  it  very  convenient  to 
shift  ever  and  anon  the  terms  of  their  theory.  The 
doctrine  they  have  to  prove,  is,  that  the  Apostohc 
office  was  designed  to  be  permanent.  Their  method 
of  proof,  is,  to  show  that  the  Apostles  actually  ap- 
pointed successors.  We  inquire  who  they  were,  and 
they  reply,  (inter  alios)  Timothy  and  Titus.  We 
demand  now  the  record  of  their  appointment  to  the 
Jipostleship.  This  they  do  not  pretend  to  be  able  to 
produce.  Vital  as  the  chain  of  succession  is  to  the  very 
existence  of  the  Church,  and  pre-eminently  essential  as 
its  first  links  are  to  its  integrity;  they  are  obliged  to 
confess  that  there  is  no  clear  and  indisputable  account 
of  the  appointment  of  these  early  Apostles.  Their 
Apostleship,  however,  we  are  informed,  is  implied  m 
the  powers  ascribed  to  them.  Let  us  see.  An  Apostle 
must  be  one  who  has  seen  the  Lord  Jesus :  was  this 
the  case  with  Timothy  and  Titus?  An  Apostle  must 
receive  an  immediate  vocation  to  the  Apostleship, 
from  heaven:  were  Timothy  and  Titus  thus  called? 
The  Apostles  were  not  restricted  to  particular  dio- 
ceses, but  had  universal  commissions:  had  Timothy 
and  Titus  such  commissions? — Still,  it  will  be  main- 
tained, they  ^vere  Apostles  in  respect  to  the  functions 
of  ordination  and.  government.  If  this  was  the  case, 
they  must  of  course  have  been  independent  of  the 
other  Apostles,  or,  what  amounts  to  the  same  thing, 
clothed  with  co-ordinate  powers:  for  the  Apostles,  it  is 
very  certain,  possessed  equal  powers  one  with  anotlier. 
But  here,  again,  the  theory  and  the  fact  are  at  vari- 
ance ;  for  nothing  is  clearer  than  that  Paul  exercised 
a  controlling  authority  over  Timothy  and  Titus.  It 
follows,  therefore,  that  whatever  these  two  ministers 
were,  they  were  not  Apostles  in  the  strict  sense  of  that 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  75 

term,  and  it  is  idle  to  bring  them  forward  as  links  in 
the  pretended  chain  of  the  Apostolical  succession. — 
Aware  of  this  flaw  in  the  demonstration,  Prelatists 
quietly  dismiss  the  term  Apostle  for  the  time,  and 
produce  arguments  to  prove  that  Timothy  and  Titus 
were  sinjply  Diocesan  Bishops.  Diocesan  Bishops, 
then,  were  subordinate  to  JlpostUs,  on  their  own 
admission.  This  control  of  the  Apostles  over  them, 
must  have  been  either  in  virtue  of  an  extraordinary 
or  of  their  ordinary  authority.  If  they  say  the  for- 
mer, they  concede  that  the  Apostles  were,  in  their 
general  jurisdiction  over  other  ministers,  extraordi- 
nary officers,  which  is  precisely  our  doctrine.  If,  on 
the  other  hand,  they  allege  that  the  Apostles  governed 
other  ministers,  these  Diocesan  Bishops  included,  in 
virtue  of  an  ordinary  power,  then  it  follows  that 
"  there  is  a  divine  Avarrant  for  a  permanent  order  of 
ministers,  in  the  Church,  superior  to  Bishops,  and 
invested  with  authority  over  them;  thus  making/ot«r 
instead  of  three  orders  of  clergy.  It  is  not  possible  to 
avoid  one  or  the  other  of  these  conclusions;  and  they 
are  equally  destructive  to  the  prelatical  system."^ 

The  considerations  just  presented  must  be  deemed 
conclusive  as  to  the  question  of  Timothy's  alleged 
succession  to  the  Jipostleship.  Was  he,  then,  a  Dio- 
cesan Bishop  ?  As  the  High-Church  theory  is  admit- 
ted by  themselves  to  depend  very  much  upon  this 
question,  we  require,  for  reasons  already  stated,  that 
the  proof  of  Timothy's  Diocesan  character  shall  be 
clear  and  decisive.  It  is  incumbent  on  them  to  show 
(1.)  that  the  language  addressed  to  Timothy,  admits 
of  no  rational  solution  on  any  other  hypothesis  than 
that  of  his  being  the  Bishop  of  Ephesus.     (2.)  They 

1  See  Dr.  Miller's  Letters,  8vo.  ed.  p.  59. 


76  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

must  furnish  the  evidence  that  he  actually  made 
Ephesus  his  permanent  residence.  (3.)  They  must 
prove  that  he  alone  exercised  the  functions  of  ordi- 
nation and  government  in  the  Ephesian  churches. 
And  (4.)  they  must  prove  that  provision  was  made 
for  a  succession  of  Prelates  in  the  "  See"  ofEphesus. 
If  they  fail  in  establishing  any  one  of  these  points, 
the  defect  is  fatal  to  their  argument.  We  affirm  that 
so  far  from  substantiating  all  of  them,  they  can  sub- 
stantiate none. 

The  view  taken  of  the  characters  of  Timothy  and 
Titus,  by  the  great  body  of  the  Protestant  divines  and 
critics,  including  some  eminent  Episcopalians,  is,  that 
they  were  Evangelists.  That  there  was  a  class  of 
officers  in  the  Primitive  Church,  bearing  this  title,  is 
indisputable.  We  read,  (Eph.  iv.  11,)  that  when  the 
Saviour  ascended,  "he  gave  some.  Apostles;  and 
some.  Prophets;  and  some,  Evangelists;  and  some, 
Pastors  and  Teachers."  Philip,  the  Deacon,  is  men- 
tioned as  an  Evangelist.  Nay,  Timothy  is  expressly 
called  an  Evangelist,  in  one  of  these  very  epistles 
relied  upon  to  prove  that  he  was  a  Prelate.  II.  Ep. 
iv.  5.  "Do  the  work  of  an  Evangelist."  Does  this 
mean,  "  Do  the  work  of  an  Jlpostle?^^  Does  it  mean, 
"  Do  the  work  of  a  Diocesan  Bishop  ?^^  If  either  of 
these  titles  had  been  used,  it  is  easy  to  conceive  with 
what  a  magisterial  air  the  passage  would  have  been 
propounded  to  non-Episcopalians,  as  an  irrefragable 
proof  of  Timothy's  Diocesan  or  Apostolic  rank.  On 
this  account  Prelatists  should  learn  to  treat  with  more 
lenity  the  iveakness  of  those  who  allow  themselves  to 
believe  that  Timothy  actually  was,  neither  an  Apos- 
tle nor  a  Diocesan  Bishop,  but  what  an  Apostle  says 
he  was,  an  Evangelist. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  77 

The  Evangelists  were  extraordinary  officers,  ap- 
pointed to  be  the  assistants  of  the  Apostles,  and 
clothed  with  powers  superior  to  those  of  ordinary- 
Pastors.  Augustine  describes  them  as  "  the  substi- 
tutes of  the  Apostles,  >vho  were  almost  equal  to 
them."  Sometimes  they  preceded  the  Apostles,  and 
founded  Churches  which  the  Apostles  subsequently 
organized ;  and  in  other  cases,  (as  those  of  Timothy 
and  Titus)  they  followed  them,  and  consummated 
the  gathering  and  organization  of  Churches  which 
the  Apostles  had  commenced.  This  view  of  their 
office  is  confirmed  by  an  authority  of  the  highest 
repute  among  Prelatists,  viz.,  the  ecclesiastical  his- 
torian, Eusebius,  who  lived  in  the  fourth  century. 
The  passage  in  which  he  treats  of  the  subject,  has 
been  a  fruitful  source  of  embarrassment  to  High- 
Churchmen.  I  quote  a  portion  of  it.  Speaking  of 
some  who  occupied  "  the  principal  place  among  the 
successors  of  the  Apostles,"  he  says,  "  These  persons, 
being  the  venerable  disciples  of  such  men,  built  up 
the  Churches  in  every  jj lace  of  which  the  foundation 
had  been  laid  by  the  Apostles,  promoting  more  and 
more  tiie  preaching  of  the  Gospel,  and  scattering 
through  the  world  the  salutary  seed  of  the  kingdom 
of  heaven.  For  many  of  the  disciples  of  that  period 
whose  minds  were  inflamed  by  the  word  with  the 
most  ardent  attachment  to  the  true  philosophy,  ful- 
filhng  the  commandment  of  their  Saviour,  divided 
their  substance  among  the  poor,  and  having  been 
sent  forth  with  authority,  performed  the  office  of 
EVANGELISTS  to  thosc  who  had  never  heard  the  word 
of  faith,  being  most  desirous  to  preach  Christ  unto 
them,  and  to  deliver  to  them  the  writings  of  the  divine 

7* 


78  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

Gospels.  These  men,  having  laid  the  foundations  of 
the  faith  in  some  remote  places,  having  ordained 
also  others  to  be  Pastors  over  them,  and  having 
committed  to  their  care  the  cultivation  of  what  they 
had  thus  begun,  hastened  -  to  other  countries  and 
7iafio)is,  being  accompanied  by  the  grace  and  power 
ofGod."^ 

Tl]is  account  of  the  office,  accords  with  the  intima- 
tions the  New  Testament  gives  us  on  the  subject: 
and  it  affords  an  easy  and  adequate  explanation  of  all 
the  passages  in  the  Epistles  to  Timothy  and  Titus, 
cited  to  prove  that  they  were  Diocesan  Bishops,  Does 
the  Apostle  direct  them  to  "  set  in  order  the  things 
that  are  wanting  and  ordain  Elders  in  every  city" — 
to  "lay  hands  suddenly  on  no  man" — to  "reject  a 
man  that  is  an  heretic,  after  the  first  and  second  ad- 
monition?" All  this  is  explained  by  a  reference  to 
their  commission  and  functions  as  Evangelists.  We 
do  not,  indeed,  feel  bound  to  admit  that  they  ordained 
alone  at  Ephesus  and  Crete  respectively.  The  lan- 
guage of  the  Apostle  does  not  necessarily  imply  this; 
and  the  fact  that  there  is  not  an  instance  recorded  in 
the  New  Testament,  of  an  ordination  performed  by 
a  single  individual,  furnishes  a  strong  presumption 
against  it.  Yet  if  this  point  were  conceded,  it  would 
derogate  nothing  from  the  force  of  our  argument :  be- 
cause we  hold  that  as  Evangelists  they  were  invested 
with  extraordinary  powers — powers  that  were  essen- 
tial in  the  first  planting  and  organization  of  churches, 
but  which  are  not  needed  in  a  settled  Church  state. 

Prclatists  attempt  to  fortify  their  theory  of  the  Pre- 
latic  character  of  Timothy,  by  appealing  to  the  ad- 
dress of  the  Apostle  to  the  Elders  of  Ephesus.  (Acts 

1  Eusebius,  lib.  iii.  sect.  36. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  79 

XX.)  In  that  address  (we  are  told)  the  Elders  are 
simply  entrusted  with  the  spiritual-  oversight  of  the 
Jlock^  i.  e.  \\\G  people  :  while  Timothy  is  charged  with 
the  control  of  the  Elders  or  the  Clergy,  as  well  as  the 
flock.  To  this  we  have  two  answers.  (1.)  We  con- 
tend that  all  the  powers  requisite  to  a  settled  Church 
state,  are  recognized  by  the  Apostle  as  belonging  to 
the  Elders  of  Ephesus.  They  are  styled  overseers 
(TiLGxoTioi,  Bishops  of  the  flock,  and  instructed  to  take 
heed  to  themselves  and  to  the  flock,  and  to  feed 
the  Church.-  These  terms  have  already  been  shown 
to  denote  a  general  power  of  government  over  the 
Churches  committed  to  them,  and,  by  necessary  im- 
plication, a  joint  jurisdiction  of  the  Eldership  over  one 
another.  (2.)  The  language  of  Paul  to  Timothy,  is 
precisely  such  language  as,  on  our  principles,  he  might 
be  expected  to'  use  in  addressing  an  Evangelist,  but 
not  such  as  he  would  employ  in  addressing  a  settled 
Pastor. — We  find  no  difficulty,  therefore,  in  harmon- 
izing with  our  views,  the  strain  of  his  two  charges 
addressed  respectively  to  the  Ephesian  Pastors  and  the 
extraordinary  officer  appointed  to  fulfil  a  temporary 
commission  among  their  churches. 

It  must  be  evident  from  the  foregoing  considera- 
tions, that  the  Scriptures  aff"ord,  to  say  the  least,  no 
conclusive  evidence  that  Timothy  and  Titus  were 
Diocesan  Bishops.  And  ^'conclusive  evidence"  is 
what  we  demand.  Mere  probabilities  will  not  an- 
swer in  a  case  which  involves  the  salvation  or  perdi- 
tion of  millions  of  human  beings.  But  even  "prob- 
abilities'^ are  wanting.  While  every  difficulty  ad- 
mits of  a  ready  solution  on  the  supposition  that  Tim- 
othy and  Titus  were   Evangelists,  there   are  very 


80  THE    HIGH-CHURCII    DOCTRINE    OP 

weighty  arguments  to  show  that  they  could  not  have 
been  Diocesan  Bishops. 

One  of  these  is  drawn  from  a  verse  which  Prela- 
tists  have  sometmics  indiscreetly  quoted  in  support  of 
their  tlieory,  viz.,  1  Tim.  i.  3,  "As  I  besought  thee 
still  to  abide  at  Ephesus,'^  &c.  Here,  they  tell  us,  is 
evidence  that  Timothy  was  to  reside  at  Ephesus. 
Unhappily,  however,  the  word  translated  abide  is 
of  very  vague  import,  and  may  denote  indefinitely 
a  long  or  a  very  short  period.  It  is  amusing,  too, 
that  such  a  passage  should  be  brought  forward  to 
prove  Timothy  a  Bishop — "For  who,  (observes  Mons. 
Daille,  the  celebrated  French  Protestant  Divine,)  with- 
out the  aid  of  an  extraordinary  passion,  could  have 
divined  a  thing  so  fine,  and  so  marvellous,  and  could 
have  imagined  that  to  entreat  a  man  to  abide  in  a  city 
was  to  appoint  him  the  Bishop  of  it.  .  .  .  Without 
exaggeration,  the  cause  of  these  hierarchical  gentle- 
men must  be  reduced  to  great  straits  when  they  are 
obliged  to  have  recourse  to  such  pitiful  arguments. 
As  to  myself,  considering  matters  coolly,  I  should  have 
concluded,  on  the  contrary,  from  the  Apostle's  be- 
seeching Timothy  to  remain  at  Ephesus,  that  he  could 
7iot  have  been  Bishop  of  Ephesus.  For  to  what  pur- 
pose would  it  be  to  entreat  a  Bishop  to  remain  in  his 
diocese  ?  Is  not  this  to  beseech  a  man  to  continue  in 
a  place  to  which  he  is  tied  down  ?  I  should  not  have 
thought  it  strange  if  he  had  been  entreated  to  leave  it, 
had  there  been  need  for  his  services  elsewhere.  But 
to  beseech  him  to  stop  in  a  place  of  which  he  had  the 
charge,  and  which  he  could  not  quit  without  dis- 
pleasing God  and  neglecting  his  duty,  to  say  the 
truth,  is  a  request  which  is  not  a  little  extraordinary, 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  81 

and  which  evidently  supposes  that  he  had  not  his 
duty  much  at  heart,  since  he  needed  to  be  besought 
to  do  it.  But,  however  that  may  be  it  is  very  cer- 
tain, that  to  beseech  a  man  to  remain  in  a  place ^  does 
not  signify  that  he  is  constituted  the  Bishop  of  it.^^ 
The  language  of  Paul  to  Timothy  and  Titus, 
shows  that  they  were  left  at  Ephesus  and  Crete  only 
for  specific  and  temporary  purposes  —  Timothy,  to 
oppose  unsound  doctrines,  and  each  of  them  to  com- 
plete the  organization  of  the  Churches.  In  accordance 
with  this  view,  the  Apostle  directs  Titus  to  come  to 
him  at  Nicopolis,  (iii.  12.)  on  the  arrival  of  Artemas, 
and  it  cannot  be  shown  that  he  returned  to  Crete. 
It  is  certain,  also,  that  Timothy  left  Ephesus;  for  a 
few  years  after  the  time  at  which  Paul's  first  Epistle 
to  him  is  generally  supposed  to  have  been  written, 
we  hear  of  him  as  sharing  the  Apostle's  imprison- 
ment at  Rome.  And  there  is  ample  reason  to  believe 
that  he  had  departed  from  Ephesus  before  the  writing 
of  the  second  Epistle.  And  herein,  by  the  way,  we 
have  an  adequate  answer  to  the  objection  urged  with 
so  much  vehemence  by  certain  Prelatists.  '^  If  Timo- 
thy was  only  an  Evangelist,"  say  they,  "how  happens 
it  that  we  find  him  still  at. Ephesus  when  the  second 
Epistle  was  written  to  him — in  which  alone  he  is 
styled  an  Evangelist?  For  by  this  time  he  must  have 
completed  the  organization  of  the  Churches  there,  and 
provided  a  sufficient  number  of  Presbyters  to  take 
charge  of  them."  I  answer  (1.)  that  there  might  have 
been  difficulties  in  the  Ephesian  Churches,  (see  Acts 
XX.  29,  30.)  or  a  continual  increase  of  converts,  such 
as  to  demand  the  presence  and  labours  of  an  Evan- 
gelist for  several  years.  But  (2.)  let  the  objectors 
prove  that  Timothy  did  remain  at  Ephesus  untff  the 


82  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

writing  of  the  second  Epistle.  There  is  not  a  word 
in  that  Epistle  to  intimate  that  he  was  there;  but  sev- 
eral things  which  import  that  he  was  not.  For  ex- 
ample, in  Ch.  iv.  12,  the  Apostle  says,  "Tychicns  have  I 
sent  to  Ephesns."  Had  Timothy  been  there,  he  would 
probably  have  said,  "  Tychicus  have  I  sent  to  you 
at  Ephesus."  And  in  the  next  verse,  he  requests 
him  to  bring  to  him  at  Rome,  his  cloak,  books 
and  parchments,  which  he  had  left  at  Troas,  This 
imports  that  Timothy  was  either  at  Troas  or  at  some 
place  in  coming  from  which  fo  Rome,  he  would  pass 
through  Troas.  But  any  one  ,who  looks  at  the  map 
will  see  that  it  would  take  him  entirely  out  of  his 
way  to  visit  Troas  in  going  from  Ephesus  to  Rome. 
Dr.  Whitby,  one  of  the  ablest  of  the  Episcopal  Commen- 
tators, gives  it  explicitly  as  his  opinion  from  these  pas^ 
sages,  that  Timothy  was  not  at  Ephesus  but  at  Troas 
at  this  period.  The  objection,  therefore,  falls  to  the 
ground. — Both  the  nature  of  their  duties,  and  thetr 
itinerant  course  of  life,  then,  are  adverse  to  the  notion 
that  Timothy  and  Titus  were  Diocesan  Bishops. 

It  is  another  argument  against  the  Prelatic  doc- 
trine, that  while  the  Apostles  specities,  in  these 
Epistles,  the  qualifications  essential  to  Bishops  or 
Presbyters,  and  Deacons,^  he  says  nothing  of  the 
qualijications  requisite  to  the  Jipostleship  or  Pre- 
lacy. On  High-Church  principles,  this  omission  is 
inexpUcable.  Is  it  credible  that  the  Apostle  would 
give  minute  directions  as  to  the  sort  of  men  to  be  se- 
lected for  the  two  ^^  inferior  grades^^  of  the  ministry, 
and  not  write  a  syllable  about  the  kind  of  men  to 
whose  jurisdiction  these  ministers  and  all  the  Churches 
of  the  Diocese  were  to  be  committed  ?     Was  it  ne- 

1  See  1  Tim.  iii.  1—13.    Titus  i.  5—11. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  S3 

cessary  to  instruct  Timothy  so  distinctly  in  relation 
to  Deacons,  and  could  the  selection  and  ordination 
of  his  own  successors  iii  the  Jlpostleship^  be  safely 
left  to  his  own  discretion  ?  The  credulity  that  can 
believe  this,  must  be  the  fruit  of  a  very  determined 
zeal  for  Prelacy.  Non-Episcopalians  find  in  this  re- 
markable omission,  a  significant  proof  that  there  were 
no  higher  officers  than_  "  Presbyter-Bishops"  to  be 
appointed  in  the  Churches  of  Crete  and  Ephesus. 

Again,  the  address  of  Paul  to  the  Ephesian  Elders 
or  Bishops  at  Miletus,  ( see  Acts  xx. )  furnishes  a 
conclusive  argument  against  the  supposed  Diocesan 
character  of  Timothy. 

It  is  very  convenient  for  Prelatists  to  assume  that 
Paul's  first  Epistle  to  Timothy  was  written  several 
years  later  than  the  date  assigned  to  it  by  the  best 
authorities.  It  is  agreed  by  the  great  body  of  learned 
critics,  ancient  and  modern,  that  this  Epistle  was 
written  about  a.d.  58,  when  Paul  had  lately  quitted 
Ephesus  on  account  of  the  tumult  raised  there  by 
Demetrius,  and  was  gone  into  Macedonia.  (Acts  xx. 
1.)  Among  others,  this  is  the  opinion  of  Athanasius, 
Theodoret,  Baronius,  Ludovic,  Capellus,  Blondel, 
Hammond,  Grotius,  Salmasius,  Lightfoot,  Benson, 
Doddridge,  and  Michaelis.^  To  these  eminent  au- 
thorities may  be  added  the  name  of  one  of  the  most 
recent  Episcopal  writers  in  this  department  of  sacred 
literature,  the  Rev.  George  Townsend,  of  the  Church 
of  England,  whose  ^'Harmony"  of  the  Old  and  New 
Testaments  has  been  widely  circulated  in  this  coun- 
try.    In  speaking  of  the  date  of  the  first  Epistle  to 

^  See  the  question  argued  in  Doddridge's  introduction  to  first  Ti- 
mothy, and  in  Hug's  Introduction  to  the  New  Testament,  pp.  534, 
753. 


84  THE    HIGPI-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

Timothy,  he  uses  this  explicit  language: — "I  have 
preferred  the  early  date  for  this  reason,  that  the  allu- 
sion to  the  youth  of  Timothy — the  fact  that  Timothy 
was  directed  to  ordain  elders  whom  St.  Paul  after- 
wards met — and  the  solemn  declaration  that  he  should 
see  their  face  no  more,  appear  to  be  so  plainly  deci- 
sive, that  I  can  admit  no  theoretical  arguments  to 
overthrow  what  seems  to  me  the  unforced  deduction 
from  Scripture,  that  the  Epistle  was  wrhten  after  St.. 
Paul  went  from  Ephesus,  and  left  Timothy  there, 
when  he  went  into  Macedonia. ^^ 

But  if  Timothy  was  Bishop  of  Ephesus  at  all,  it 
must  have  been  ivhen  this  first  Epistle  ivas  ivritten; 
for  it  is  this  Epistle  which  furnishes  oar  Prelatical 
brethren  with  very  nearly  all  the  evidence  they  have 
that  he  was  a  Bishop.  Of  course  then,  he  was  Bish- 
op of  Ephesus  when  the  Apostle  had  his  interview 
with  the  Eiders  at  Miletus.  ■  Timothy  was  present 
on  that  occasion.  1  Yet  Paul,  in  so  far  as  the  narra- 
tive informs  us,  did  not  take  the  least  notice  of  him. 
Instead  of  addressing  himself  to  the  "Bishop,''  he 
delivers  his  whole  charge  to  his  Presbyters.  With 
their  Bishop  standing  by,  he  commits  the  entire  go- 
vernment and  control  of  the  Church  into  their 
hands.  He  does  not  so  much  as  tell  them  how  they 
are  to  deport  themselves  towards  their  Diocesan,  nor 
even  allude  to  the  fact  of  their  having  one. — He  who 
can  believe  all  this,  must  admit  that  the  Apostle  had 
very  different  ideas  of  the  rights  and  immunities  of 
Diocesan  Bishops,  from  those  entertained  by  some 
modern  advocates  of  Prelacy. 

If,  on  the  other  hand,  the  ground  is  taken  that 
Timothy  was  not  appointed  Bishop  of  Ephesus  until 

'  ?ee  Acts  xx.  4,  15,  17. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  85 

after  the  interview  just  mentioned,  then  it  will  fol- 
low, that  whatever  powers  are  conceded  to  him 
in  Paul's  first  Epistle,  he  possessed  these  powers 
without  being  a  Diocesan  Bishop ;  for  that  Epistle 
was  written,  as  we  have  seen,  prior  to  the  interview 
in  question.  Again,  If  he  was  not  made  Bishop  of 
Ephesus  until  after  the  interview  at  Miletus,  it  is 
very  surprising  that  the  Apostle  should  have  made 
no  allusion  to  this  serious  defect  in  their  organization. 
It  would  be  quite  out  of  character  for  a  High-Church 
Prelate  of  our  day,  to  deliver  a  formal  charge  to  the 
assembled  clergy  of  a  vacant  Diocese,  without  so 
much  as  alluding  to  the  fact  of  their  having  no  Dio- 
cesan. Yet  this  was  done — if  we  are  to>  receive  the 
Prelatic  theory— by  so  courteous  and  sound  a  Church- 
man as  the  Apostle  Paul,  in  his  charge  to  the  clergy 
of  Ephesus.  This  consideration  will  have  due  weight 
with  every  impartial  mind :  but  what  I  chiefly  insist 
upon  as  regards  this  transaction  at  Miletus,  is  the 
dilemma  previously  stated.  Either  Timothy  was 
Bishop  of  Ephesus  at  the  time  Paul  delivered  his 
charge  to  the  Ephesian  Elders,  or  he  was  not.  If 
he  was,  how  happens  it  that  the  Apostle  makes  no 
allusion  to  him,  and  commits  the  government  of  the 
Churches  into  the  hands  of  the  Elders,  and  that  in 
\)ciQ  presence  of  their  Diocesan?  If  he  was  ^o/,  then 
he  was  not  Bishop  of  Ephesus  when  Paul's  first 
Epistle  to  him  was  written,  and  all  the  supposed 
evidences  of  his  Prelatic  character  drawn  from  that 
Epistle,  are  annulled. 

There  is  only  one  possible  way  by  which  this  di- 
lemma can  be  eluded,  viz.,  by  proving  that  the  first 
Epistle  was  written  after  the  interview  at  Miletus. 
But  this  is  a  point  which  never  has  been,  and  which  it 

8 


86  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

is  hazarding  little  to  say,  never  can  be,  proved.  For 
— other  arguments  apart — Paul's  address  to  the  El- 
ders contains  a  solemn  prophecy  that  he^hould  never 
meet  them  again  in  this  world.  "  I  knoio,^^  he  says, 
"  that  ye  .  .  .  shall  see  my  face  no  viore.^^  But  his 
first  Epistle  was  written  soon  after  his  departure  from 
Ephesus,  on  some  occasion,  to  go  into  Macedonia,  (see 
eh.  i.  3,  "As  I  besought  thee  to  abide  still  at  Ephesus, 
when  I  went  into  Macedonia,")  and  it  contains  am- 
ple evidence  that  he  expected  to  return  there.  Thus 
he  says,  ch.  iii.  14,  "These"  things  write  I  unto  thee, 
hoping  to  come  unto  thee  shortly.^'  And  again,  iv. 
13,  "  Till  I  come,  give  attendance  to  reading,  to  ex- 
hortation, to  doctrine."  This  expectation  of  return- 
ing to  Ephesus,  must  have  been  prior  to  that  inter- 
view in  the  course  of  which  he  so  impressively  as- 
sures them  that  they  "  are  to  see  his  face  no  more,^^ 
The  Epistle,  therefore,  was  written  before  the  trans- 
action at  Miletus :  and  hence  the  dilemma  to  which 
Prelatists  are  reduced  by  this  comparison  of  dates, 
remains.  Whichever  horn  of  that  dilemma  is  taken, 
the  argument  against  Timothy's  prelatical  character 
is  conclusive. 

Such  are  some  of  the  arguments  which  have  sat- 
isfied non-Episcopalians  in  the  various  Reformed 
Churcheg,  that  Timothy  and  Titus  were  not  Diocesan 
Bishops.  There  is  one  other  consideration  which 
ought  not  to  be  omitted  in  discussing  the  subject  of  the 
apostolical  Succession.  The  advocates  of  this  doc- 
trine profess  to  be  able  to  trace  up  their  descent  to  the 
Apostles.  They  allege — with  how  much  reason,  we 
have  seen — that  Timothy  and  Titus  were  successors 
of  the  Apostles  in  the  Apostolic  office.  We  now  re- 
quire them  to  show  that   Timothy  and   Titus  ap- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  87 

pointed pei'sons  to  succeed  themselves  in  the  v^postle- 
ship.  If  they  were,  as  we  contend,  extraordinary 
officers  clothed  with  a  special  and  temporary  mission, 
we  should  not  look  for  any  instructions  in  the  Epis- 
tles addressed  to  them,  in  relation  to  successors.  But 
if  they  were  the  Bishops — XhQ  first  Bishops — of  Ephe- 
sus  and  Crete,  we  might  reasonably  expect  to  find  a 
great  deal  in  these  Epistles  about  the  succession. 
Which  of  these  views  is  sustained  b^  the  tone  of  the 
Epistles,  will  be  manifest  when  it  is  stated,  that  the 
diligence  and  zeal  of  Prelacy  have  not  been  able  to 
discover  a  syllable  in  the  Epistle  to  Titus,  so  much  as 
hinting  at  the  succession  in  the  See  of  Crete;  and 
that  there  is  but  one  solitary  passage  in  the  Epistles 
to  Timothy,  which  is  claimed  as  bearing  upon  the 
succession  in  the  See  of  Ephesus.  This  passage,  it 
will  surprise  plain  readers  of  the  Bible  to  learn,  is  the 
folio wmg:  first  Epistle,  vi.  13, 14, "  I  give  thee  charge 
in  the  sight  of  God that  thou  keep  this  com- 
mandment without  spot  unrebukable,  until  the  ap- 
23earing  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ. ^^  By  the  appear- 
ing of  the  Saviour  here,  is  meant,  it  is  said,  his  ap- 
pearing to  judge  the  world;  and  hence  it  was  design- 
ed that  Timothy's  office  should  be  perpetuated. 

It  seems  a  waste  of  time  to  stop  to  refute  such  spe- 
cimens of  exegesis  as  this :  but  as  it  is  the  best  war- 
rant that  can  be  produced  for  the  succession  at  Ephe- 
sus, it  may  be  well  to  notice  it.  Their  own  Stilling- 
fleet  shall  furnish  the  answer.  "  First, ^^  he  observes, 
'^  it  is  no  ways  certain  what  this  command  was  which 
St.  Paul  speaks  of:  some  understand  it  of  fighting  the 
good  fight  of  faith,  [see  context]  others  of  the  precept 
of  love,  others  most  probably  the  sum  of  all  contained 
in  this  Epistle  which  I  confess  implies  in  it,  (as  being 


88  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

one  great  part  of  the  Epistle,)  Paul's  direction  of  Tim- 
othy for  the  right  discharging  of  his  office.  But  grant- 
ing that  the  command  respects  Timothy's  office,  yet 
I  answer,  secondly^  it  manifestly  appears  to  be  some- 
thing/?er5o;i«/,  and  not  successive)  or  at  least  nothing 
can  be  inferred  for  the  necessity  of  such  a  succession 
from  this  place  which  it  was  brought  for ;  nothing  being 
more  evident  than  that  this  command  related  to  TiTn- 
othy^s  personal  observance  of  it.  And,  therefore, 
Christ's  appearing  here  is  not  meant  of  his  second 
coming  to  judgment,  but  it  only  imports  the  time  of 
Timothy'^ s  decease.  So  Chrysostom,  "  Until  the  end, 
until  the  departure."  So  Estius,  "Until  the  termina- 
tion of  life."  ....  And  the  reason  why  the  time  of  his 
death  is  set  out  by  the  coming  of  Christ,  is,  as  Chry- 
sostom, and  from  him  Theophylact  observes,  "  that  it 
might  incite  him  the  more"  both  to  diligence  in  his 
work  and  patience  under  sufferings  from  the  considera- 
tion of  Christ's  appearance.  The  plain  meaning  of 
the  words,  then,  is  the  same  with  that.  Rev.  ii.  10, 
"  Be  thou  faithful  unto  death,  and  I  will  give  thee  a 
crown  of  life."  Nothing,  then,  can  be  hence  inferred 
as  to  the  necessary  succession  of  some  in  Timothy's 
office,  whatever  it  is  supposed  to  be.''^ 

Such,  in  the  judgment  of  this  able  and  candid 
Episcopalian,  is  the  scriptural  warrant  for  the  notion 
that  the  succession  of  Apostles  or  Prelates,  was  to  be 
perpetuated  in  the  Church  of  Ephesus, — a  conclu- 
sion strongly  corroborated  by  the  fact  mentioned  by 
the  learned  Dr.  Campbell,  in  his  Lectures  on  Eccle- 
siastical History,  that  "neither  Timothy  nor  Titus  is 
styled  "Bishop"  by  any  writer  in  the  first  three  cen- 

1  Irenicum,  Chap.  iv. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  89 

turies."  (Lect.  V.  p.  79.)  Yet  this  "Diocese"  is  the 
very  citadel  of  High-Churchism.  And  it  is  from  its 
ramparts  that  they  are  for  ever  proclaiming  the  idle 
and  arrogant  assumption,  that  to  be  disunited  with  a 
Church  which  has  had  an  unbroken  succession  of 
Apostles  from  the  days  of  the  twelve,  is  to  be  aban- 
doned to  "uncovenanted  mercy." 

I  have  dwelt  the  longer  upon  the  cases  of  Timo- 
thy and  Titus,  because,  as  was  jast  intimated,  Prelat- 
ists  usually  rely  more  upon  these  two  witnesses  in 
vindicating  their  system,  than  upon  any  other  scrip- 
tural argument.  All  that  is  necessary,  as  to  these 
cases,  let  it  be  remembered,  in  order  to  invalidate  the 
theory  of  the  Apostolical  Succession  as  held  by  High 
Churchmen,  is,  to  show  that  it  is  doubtful  whether 
Timothy  and  Titus  were  appointed  to  the  Apostle- 
ship.  If  Prelatists  cannot  establish  the  affirmative  of 
this  proposition  beyond  a  reasonable  doubt,  by  clear 
scriptural  2^roofs,  their  pretensions  can  only  excite 
the  ridicule  or  the  pity  of  intelligent  men.  For  with 
what  decency  can  it  be  pretended  that  the  alternative 
offered  to  the  world,  is.  Prelacy  or  perdition,  if 
there  is  the  slightest  defect  in  the  scriptural  evidence 
on  which  the  theory  of  Prelacy  rests?  Instead  of 
showing,  however,  that  the  alleged  Apostleship  of 
Timothy  and  Titus  is  barely  doubtful,  it  has,  if  I 
mistake  not,  been  proved  that  Timothy  was  ordained 
by  a  Presbytery,  and  could  not,  therefore,  on  High- 
Church  principles,  have  been  an  Apostle  or  Prelate 
— that  there  are  insuperable  objections  to  the  hypoth- 
esis that  Titus  and  himself  were  either  Apostles  in 
the  appropriate  import  of  that  title,  or  Diocesan  Bish- 
ops— that  they  could  only  have  been  Evangelists 
— and  that  whatever  their  office  was,  the  Bible  does 


90  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

not  furnisli  the  least  evidence  that  they  were  to  have 
successors. — From  all  which  I  conclude  that  Timo- 
thy and  Titus,  instead  of  testifying  that  "  the  Jipos- 
tolic  office  was  designed  to  be  permanent ^^  are  good 
witnesses  to  prove  the  very  reverse.  * 

As  this  volume  is  not  designed  as  a  formal  treatise 
on  Prelacy,  I  pass  by,  for  want  of  room  only,  the 
arguments  drawn  from  the  constitution  of  the  Leviti- 
cal  Priesthood  and  from  the  alleged  Diocesan  charac- 
ter of  the  Apostle  James,  to  notice,  briefly,  the  argu- 
ment derived  from  the  short  epistles  addressed  to 
the  Seven  Churches  of  Asia.  (See  Rev.  ii.  and  iii.) 
Prelatists  find  Apostles  or  Diocesan  Bishops  in  the 
'^  Angels^''  of  these  Churches.  The  epistles,  they  say, 
are  inscribed  to  them  individually;  they  are  address- 
ed as  having  the  exclusive  control  of  the  Churches; 
they  are  held  responsible  for  all  the  evils  which  pre- 
vailed among  them ;  and  the  whole  tone  of  the  Sa- 
viour's language  to  them  is  such  as  can  be  reconciled 
Avith  no  other  theory  than  that  of  their  being  Dioce- 
san Bishops. 

This  argument  depends  on  the  two-fold  assump- 
tion that  the  titles  "angel''  and  "star"  (the  "se- 
ven stars,''  ch.  i.  20,  being  the  emblems  of  the 
"seven  angels,")  can  be  employed  only  to  denote 
single   individuals,   and   that   these   individiials   can 

'  A  single  word  on  the  postscripts  to  these  epistles,  before  leaving 
them.  In  the  Postscripts  to  second  Timothy  and  Titus,  these  Evan- 
gelists are  styled  the  "■Bishops'"  of  the  Churches  respectively  '*  of  the 
Ephesians"  and  "  of  the  Cretians,"  It  may  be  proper,  therefore,  to 
state  that  all  respectable  writers  admit  that  these  postscripts  are 
interpolations.  It  is  agreed  tliat  their  origin  is  not  earlier  than  the 
fiflli  century.  Of  course  they  arc  not  to  be  relied  upon  as  authority; 
and  they  arc  never  quoted  in  this  controversy  by  Prelatists  or  their 
Gpposers. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  91 

only  be  Diocesan  Bishops.  To  notice  the  latter  of 
these  assumptions,  first: — Let  the  origin  of  the  ex- 
pression, the  "  Angel  of  the  Church,''  be  considered, 
as  stated  by  that  great  Rabbinical  scholar,  Dr.  Light- 
foot.  "  Besides  these,"  he  says,  (the  three  rulers  of 
the  synagogue,)  "  there  was  the  public  minister  of  the 
synagogue,  who  prayed  publicly,  and  took  care  about 
the  reading  of  the  law,  and  sometimes  preached,  if 
there  were  not  others  to  discharge  that  office.  This 
person  was  called  Sheliach  Zibbor,  the  Jlngel  of  the 
Church,  and  the  Chazan  or  Bishop  of  the  congrega- 
tion. .  .  The  service  and  worship  of  the  Temple  being 
abolished,  as  being  ceremonial,  God  transplanted  the 
worship  and  public  adoration  of  God  used  in  the 
synagogues,  which  was  moral,  into  the  Christian 
Church ;  to  wit,  the  public  ministry,  public  prayers, 
reading  God's  word,  and  preaching,  &c.  Hence  the 
names  of  the  ministers  of  the  Gospel  were  the  very 
same,  the  Angel  of  the  Church,  and  the  Bishop, 
which  belonged  to  the  ministers  in  the  synagogues." 
"As  the  Sheliach  Zibbor,  then,  (adds  Dr.  Brown, ^) 
or  Bishop  of  the  synagogue,  had  no  authority  be- 
yond the  single  congregation  in.  which  he  minis- 
tered, and  as  he  exercised  that  authority  along  with 
the  rulers  of  the  synagogue,  (though  he  was  not  the 
chief  ruler,)  it  is  plain  that  the  application  of  the 
name  ^  Angel'  to  the  minister  of  each  of  these  Asiatic 
Churches,  even  supposing  him  to  be  only  a  single 
person  acting  on  his  own  individual  capacity,  fur- 
nishes no  proof  that  he  had  authority  over  the  minis- 
ters of  other  congregations  or  Christian  synagogues, 
and  much  less  would  it  justify  any  Bishop  in  the  pre- 
sent day  for  being  invested  with   authority  over  a 

On  "Piiseyite  Episcopacy,"  p.  226.     Edin.  ed. 


92  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

hundred  or  a  thousand  ministers  and  as  many  con- 
gregations." 

Some  writers  of  great  respectability  have  supposed 
the  jjresldents  or  moderators  of  the  several  Presby- 
teries, to  be  intended  by  the  *^  Angels  of  the  Church- 
es/'— the  epistles  being  inscribed  to  them  personally, 
though  intended  for  the  body  over  which,  though  of 
the  same  order,  they  presided. 

Others,  again,  have  held,  as  did  Mr.  Dodwell  in 
the  latter  part  of  his  life,  that  the  angels  were  proba- 
bly itinerary  legates,  or  special  missionaries  sent 
from  Jerusalem  to  visit  these  Churches. 

A  more  popular  opinion  has  been  that  these  Epis- 
tles, though  addressed  to  the  angels  or  ministers, 
were  designed  for  the  ministers  and  people  in  com- 
n^on — an  opinion  which  is  favoured  by  several  ex- 
pressions in  the  epistles. 

The  view,  however,  usually  adopted  by  non-pre- 
latic  writers,  is,  that  the  titles,  "  star"  and  "  angel," 
denote  the  collective  body  of  ministers  in  each  of  the 
seven  churches. — This  brings  me  to  the  second  as- 
sumption of  the  Prelatists,  viz.  that  these  titles  can 
be  used  only  to  denote  single  individuals.  In  oppo- 
sition to  this  view  it  may  be  observed,  that  the 
"seven  candlesticks  (i.  20)  are  the  seven  churches." 
Each  candlestick  represents  one  church.  Now  if 
these  seven  churches  embraced  each  but  a  single 
congregation,  their  pastors  or  "angels"  could  not 
have  been  Diocesan  Bishops.  If  they  embraced 
more  than  one  congregation  each,  still  they  are  re- 
presented by  one  candlestick.  And  if  a  plurality  of 
congregations  may  be  represented  by  one  candlestick, 
why  may  not  a  plurality  oi  ministers  be  represented 
by  one  star  ? 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  93 

As  regards  the  other  term,  "angels,"  we  have  the 
opinion  of  such  men  as  Dr.  Henry  More,  Joseph 
Mede,  Dr.  Fulk,  and  Stillingfieet,  that  it  is  used  in 
the  Apocalypse  as  a  noun  of  multitude.  "If  many 
things  in  the  Epistles  be  direct  to  the  angels,  (says 
StiUingfleet)  but  yet  so  as  to  concern  the  whole  body, 
then  of  necessity  the  ^ angel'  must  be  taken  as  a  re- 
presentative of  the  whole  body,  and  then,  why  may 
not  the  word  '  angeP  be  taken  by  way  of  representa- 
tion of  the  body  itself;  either  of  the  whole  Church, 
or,  which  is  far  more  probable,  of  the  Consessus  or 
order  of  Presbyters  in  that  Church?  We  see  what 
miserable,  unaccountable  arguments  those  are  which 
are  brought  for  any  kind  of  government,  from  meta- 
phorical or  ambiguous  expressions  or  names  pro- 
miscuously used." 

A  noted  example  of  the  use  of  the  term  here  con- 
tended for,  occurs  in  the  sixth  verse  of  the  fourteenth 
chapter  of  this  book.  "  I  saw  another  angel  fly  in 
the  midst  of  heaven,  having  the  everlasting  Gospel 
to  preach  unto  them  that  dwell  on  the  earth,  and  to 
every  nation  and  kindred  and  tongue  and  peopled 
"  Heaven"  (observes  Dr.  Mason  on  this  verse,)  "  in 
this  book,  is  the  ascertained  symbol  of  the  Christian 
Church,  from  which  issue  forth  the  '  ministers  of 
grace'  to  the  nations.  As  the  Gospel  is  preached 
only  by  me?z,  this  angel  who  has  it  to  preach  to 
'  every  nation  and  kindred  and  tongue  and  people,' 
must  be  the  symbol  of  a  human  ministry.  And  as 
it  is  perfectly  evident  that  no  single  man  can  thus 
preach  it,  but  that  there  must  be  a  great  company 
of  preachers  to  carry  it  to  '  every  nation  and  kindred 
and  tongue  and  people,'  the  angel  mentioned  in  the 


94  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

text  is,  and  of  necessity  must  be,  the  symbol  of  that 
great  company!'^ — It  is  for  Prelatists  to  show  that 
the  term  may  not  in  like  manner  be  used  in  these 
seven  epistles  as  a  collective  noun,  to  signify  the 
ivh(fie  body  of  ministers  in  each  Church.  That  this 
view  of  the  import  of  the  name  harmonizes  much 
better  with  the  various  parts  of  these  epistles  than 
that  which  makes  the  angels  Diocesan  Bishops,  will 
be  evident  from  two  or  three  considerations. 

(1.)  If  the  term  "angels"  denotes  only  the  Bishops 
of  these  churches,  the  Epistles  contain  no  allusion 
whatever  to  the  other  ministers.  As  these  ministers 
must  have  outnumbered  the  Prelates,  and  their  influ- 
ence for  good  or  evil  upon  the  churches  have  been 
very  potent,  such  an  omission  is  not  easily  to  be  ac- 
counted for. 

(2.)  If  the  Angel  of  the  Church  of  Ephesus  be  ad- 
dressed as  a  single  person,  and  not  as  the  representa- 
tive of  the  whole  of  the  ministers,  is  it  not  further  in- 
explicable that  because  he  alone  hdid '^  left  his  Jirst 
love/'  the  Redeemer  should  threaten,  if  he  did  not 
repent,  to  extinguish  that  Church,  or  remove  its 
candlestick  out  of  its  place  ? 

(3.)  Some  of  the  Epistles  use  the  singular  and 
plural  pronouns  interchangeably — which  shows  that 
the  angels  are  not  single  individuals.  Thus,  the  Sa- 
viour says  to  the  angel  of  the  Church  of  Smyrna,  "  I 
know  thy  works,  &c.  Behold  the  devil  shall  cast  some 
of  you  into  prison  that  ye  may  be  tried :  and  ye  shall 
have  tribulation  ten  days :  be  thou  faithful  unto  death, 
and  I  will  give  thee  a  crown  of  Hfe."  And  to  the 
angel  of  the  Church  of  Thyatyra,  he  says,  "  I  know 
thy  works,  &c But  unto  you  {v^sii)  I  say,  and 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  95 

unto  the  7'est  in  Thyatyra,  as  many  as  have  not  this 

doctrine  &c But  that  which  ye  have  aheady, 

hold  fast  till  I  come." 

Prelatists  try  to  evade  this  difficulty  by  saying  that 
where  these  plural  forms  of  expression  occur,  the  Sa- 
viour addresses  the  people.  But  (1.)  this  is  incompat- 
ible with  their  prime  principle  that  the  angels  must 
be  single  individuals ;  for  whoever  may  be  intended 
by  these  plural  pronouns,  they  must  be  iiicluded  un- 
der the  term  "  angels."  (2.)  It  is  a  fatal  objection  to 
this  interpretation,  that  while  the  peojjle  of  Smyrna 
are  told  that  they  are  to  be  '•  cast  into  prison,"  the 
promise^  "  Be  ihou  faithful  unto  death  and  I  will  give 
thee  a  crow^n  of  life,"  is  given  exclusively  to  the 
Bishop.  "  If  the  *  angeP  is  the  collective  body  of  the 
ministry  upon  whom  the  persecution  was  to  fall,  then 
the  exhortations,  "  Fear  none  of  those  things  which 
thou  shalt  suffer" — "  Be  thou  faithful  unto  death  ;" 
and  the  promise,  ^'  I  will  give  thee  a  crown  of  life," 
are  in  harmony  with  the  premonition,  that  "  the  devil 
should  cast  some  of  them  into  prison."  The  anticipa- 
tion of  evil  is  softened  by  the  assurance  of  support. 
But  according  to  the  Episcopal  construction,  the  sor- 
row goes  one  way,  and  the  consolation  the  other. 
The  Bishop  is  exhorted  not  to  fear :  to  be  faithful 
unto  death :  but  it  seems  that  the  people  only  are  to 
bear  the  calamity."  ^  It  may  be  safely  left  to  candid 
minds  to  judge  whether  an  interpretation  can  be  cor- 
rect which  involves  such  absurdities  as  this. 

On  the  whole,  when  the  general  tenor  of  the  Book 
of  Revelation  and  the  highly  figurative  language  in 
which  most  of  it  is  written,  are  considered,  it  is  a 

1  Dr.  Mason. 


96  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

great  weakness,  and  argues  a  bad  cause,  to  appeal  to 
these  Epistles,  as  furnishing  any  decisive  testimony 
on  the  subject  of  Church-government.  Prelatists  may 
assume,  but  it  is  certain  they  can  never  prove,  that 
the  angels  of  these  Churches,  were  either  Apostles  or 
Diocesan  Bishops. — Until  they  have  proved  this,  and 
with  this  have  distinctly  and  conclusively  shown  that 
these  officers  were  instructed  to  appoint  Successors  of 
apostolic  rank,  we  must  decline  acknowledging  the 
seven  angels  as  competent  witnesses  to  establish  the 
perpetuity  of  the  apostolic  office. 

Such  is  the  scriptural  argument  for  the  second  pro- 
position embraced   in   the  Prelatic  theory,  viz.  that 

"  THE  APOSTOLIC  OFFICE,  CONSIDERED  IN  REFERENCE 
TO  ITS  EXCLUSIVE  FUNCTIONS  OF  JURISDICTION  AND 
ORDINATION,     WAS     DESIGNED     TO     BE     PERMANENT." 

The  proposition  that  "  these  functions  belonged 

EXCLUSIVELY  TO    THE  APOSTLESHIP,"  WaS    prCVioUsly 

examined.  Without  taking  up  every  argument  at- 
tempted to  be  drawn  from  the  word  of  God  in  support 
of  these  views,  (a  thing  which  is  precluded  by  the  limits 
prescribed  to  myself  in  this  discussion)  I  have  selected 
those  on  which  the  most  reliance  is  usually  placed, 
and  endeavoured  to  weigh  them  with  candour.  It  is 
sufficient  to  invalidate  the  High-Church  doctrine,  if 
these  propositions  have  been  shown  to  be  even  doubt- 
ful But  may  it  not  be  claimed  that  something  more 
than  this  has  been  done, — that  they  have  been  fairly 
and  effectually  disproved?  It  has  been  shown,  if 
I  mistake  not,  that  the  powers  of  jurisdiction  and  or- 
dination, were  exercised  as  well  by  Presbyters  as 
by  the  Apostles ;  and  that  the  Epistles  to  Timothy 
and  Titus,  and  those  addressed  to  the  seven  Asiatic 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  97 

churches,  so  far  from  countenancing  the,  idea  that  the 
Apostles  were  to  have  successors  in  the  Apostleship, 
contain  passages  that  are  irreconcilable  with  that  hy- 
pothesis. These  conclusions  might  be  fortified  by  a 
great  body  of  Scripture  testimonies  which  have  not 
been  brought  forward :  for  all  the  passages  that  go 
directly  to  prove  \hG,  j^arity  of  the  ministry^  confirm 
the  results  to  which  we  have  been  conducted. 

It  will  no  doubt  excite  the  surprise  of  individuals 
who  have  not  investigated  the  subject  before,  to  find 
that  there,  is  so  very  little  in  the  word  of  God  to 
favour  the  High-Church  system.  The  confidence 
and  even  arrogance  with  which  the  supporters  of 
that  system^  pronounce  all  who  reject  it  to  be  out  of 
the  pale  of  the  Church,  have  produced  the  impression 
upon  many  minds  that  the  Bible  must  at  least  fur- 
nish a  specious  warrant  for  it.  But  the  pretensions 
of  theorists,  as  well  in  religion  as  in  science,  are  apt 
to  be  in  an  inverse  proportion  to  the  strength  of  the 
evidence  on  which  their  theories  rest. — "For  myself, 
[I  adopt  here  with  some  slight  variations,  the  lan- 
guage of  the  learned  and  venerable  Dr.  Miller,]  I 
most  conscientiously  declare  that  the  arguments  at- 
tempted to  be  drawn  from  Scripture,  in  favour  of  Pre 
lacy,  do  not  appear  to  me  to  possess  the  smallest 
degree  of  real  force.  I  can  truly  say,  that  when  I 
first  approached  the  investigation  of  the  subject,  I 
expected  to  find  much  more  in  the  sacred  volume 
appearing  to  favour  the  Episcopal  cause,  than  I  have 
since  been  able  to  discover.  It  did  not  occur  to  me 
as  possible,  that  such  confident  appeals  to  Scripture 
could  be  continually  made,  on  grounds  so  entirely 
unsolid.     I  might  have  recollected,  indeed,  the  deci- 

9 


9S  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

sive  tone  with  which  many  ingenious  and  learned 
men  have  resorted  to  the  sacred  oracles  to  estabUsh 
the  supremacy  of  the  Pope,  and  the  damning  sin  of 
separation  from  the  Church  of  Rome.  Nor  ought 
we  to  be  surprised  that  pious  and  learned  men,  of 
other  denominations,  should  fall  into  similar  mis- 
takes, and  express  equal  confidence  of  finding  sup- 
port where  none  is  in  reality  to  be  found.  The  late 
Mr.  Burke  has  somewhere  said,  *Let  us  only  suffer 
any  person  to  tell  us  his  story  morning  and  evening 
but  for  one  twelve  month,  and  he  will  become  our 
master.'  Many  zealous  advocates  of  Prelacy  have 
been  so  long  in  the  habit  of  saying,  and  of  hearing  it 
said,  that  the  Scriptures  ^clearly,'  ^strongly,'  and 
'unquestionably'  declare  in  favour  of  their  system; 
and  some  of  them  are  so  little  in  the  habit  of  reading 
the  refutations  of  this  error,  that  they  unfeignedly 
believe  it,  and  scruple  not  to  stigmatize  all  who  do 
not  see  it,  as  given  up  to  blindness  and  prejudice. 
But,  happily,  we  have  the  sacred  volume  in  our 
hands,  as  well  as  they;  and  after  the  most  dispas- 
sionate examination,  are  compelled  to  pronounce 
their  arguments  from  Scripture  nugatory;  their  con- 
fidence totally  unwarranted;  and  the  system  which 
they  profess  to  found  on  the  word  of  God,  a  fabric 
resting  alone  on  human  contrivance."  ^ 

1  On  the  Christian  Ministry,  Let.  III.  8vo.  ed. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  99 


CHAPTER  IV. 

THE    HISTORICAL    ARGUMENT. 

I  BEGIN  this  chapter  with  a  brief  extract  from  the 
Westminster  Confession  of  Faith. 

Chapter  I.  Sect.  6.  "  The  whole  counsel  of  God 
concerning  all  things  necessary  for  his  own  glory, 
man's  salvation,  faith,  and  life,  is  either  expressly  set 
down  in  Scripture,  or  by  good  and  necessary  conse- 
quence may  be  deduced  from  Scripture:  unto  which, 
nothing  at  any  time  is  to  be  added,  whether  by  new 
revelations  of  the  Spirit  or  traditions  of  men." 

Section  10.  "The  Supreme  Judge,  by  whom  all 
controversies  of  religion  are  to  be  determined,  and  all 
decrees  of  councils,  opinions  of  ancient  writers,  doc- 
trines of  men,  and  private  spirits,  are  to  be  examined, 
and  in  whose  sentence  we  are  to  rest,  can  be  no 
other  but  the  Holy  Spirit  speaking  in  the  Scripture." 

Applying  these  principles  to  the  case  in  hand,  the 
author  cordially  concurs  with  the  ecclesiastical  head 
of  the  Diocese  of  Pennsylvania,  in  these  observa- 
tions:— "The  claim  of  Episcopacy  to  be  of  divine 
institution,  and  therefore  obligatory  on  the  Church, 
rests  fundamentally  on  the  one  question — has  it  the 
authority  of  Scripture?  If  it  has  not,  it  is  not  ne- 
cessarily binding."  ....  "  This  one  point  should  be 
kept  in  view  in  every  discussion  of  the  subject;  no 
argument  is  worth  taking  into  account  that  has  not 
a  palpable  bearing  on  the  clear  and  naked  topic — 
the  scriptural  evidence  of  Episcopacy."^     The  con- 

>  "  Episcopacy  tested  by  Scripture,"  p.  3. 


100  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

elusions  to  which  the  scriptural  3.rgument  has  con- 
ducted ns,  in  this  inquiry,  are  not  to  be  invahdated 
by  any  array  of  mere  patristic  and  traditionary 
authorities.  Tlie  Christian  fathers  are  entitled  to  the 
same  respect  as  men  of  equal  piety  and  intelligence 
in  other  ages  of  the  Church ;  but  the  exorbitant  vene- 
ration entertained  for  them  by  Romanists  and  High- 
Churchmen,  has  been  a  source  of  incalculable  mis- 
chief to  the  Church.  The  writer  has  no  sympathy 
with  that  class  of  persons  mentioned  by  Milton,  who, 
"as  if  the  divine  Scripture  wanted  a  supplement, 
and  were  to  be  eked  out,  cannot  think  any  doubt 
resolved  and  any  doctrine  confirmed,  unless  they  run 
to  that  undigested  heap  and  fry  of  authors  which 
they  call  antiquity."  For,  with  him,  he  believes  that 
"  whatsoever  time,  or  the  heedless  hand  of  blind 
chance,  hath  drawn  from  of  old  to  this  present,  in 
her  huge  drag-net,  whether  fish  or  sea-weed,  shells  or 
shrubs,  unpicked,  unchosen,  those  are  the  Fathers."  i 
The  assurance,  however,  with  which  Prelatists  are 
in  the  habit  of  asserting  that  the  testimony  of  the  primi- 
tive Church  is  entirely  in  their  favour,  makes  it  pro- 
per to  dwell  on  this  point  for  a  little  before  proceed- 
ing with  the  argument.  I  shall  show  in  another  con- 
nexion, that  it  was  the  common  judgment  of  the  Re- 
formers and  the  Reformed  Churches,  that  Bishops  and 
Presbyters  are  by  divine  institution  of  one  order ^  and 
that  the  existing  arrangement  in  Prelatical  Churches 
by  which  the  powers  of  jurisdiction  and  ordination 
have  been  taken  from  Presbyters  and  given  exclu- 
sively to  the  Bishops,  is  a  matter  of  mere  human 
arrangement.  For  the  present,  I  content  myself  with 
citing  the  testimony  of  a  single  witness  from  antiquity 

•  Treatise  "  of  Prelatical  Episcopacy." 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  101 

in  proof  of  these  points.  This  witness  is  the  celebra- 
ted Jerome,  who  flourished  about  the  year  four  hun- 
dred, and  of  whom  Erasmus  declared,  that  "  he  was, 
without  controversy,  the  most  learned  of  all  Chris- 
tians, the  prince  of  divines,  and  for  eloquence  that  he 
excelled  Cicero."  The  extracts  that  follow,  will 
furnish  an  adequate  answer  to  the  questions  so  often 
asked  about  the  time  and  manner  of  the  rise  of  Pre- 
lacy. I  give  them  from  Dr.  Mason's  translation. 
The  first  passage  is  taken  from  Jerome's  commentary 
on  Titus  i.  5. 

"  That  thou  shouldest  ordain  Presbyters  in  every 
city,  as  I  had  appointed  thee." — "  What  sort  of  Pres- 
byters ought  to  be  ordained  he  shows  afterwards  : 
"  If  any  be  blameless,  the  husband  of  one  wife,  &c., 
and  then  adds,  for  a  bishop  must  be  blameless,  as 
the  steward  of  God,  &c.  A  Presbyter,  therefore,  is 
the  same  as  a  Bishop,  and  before  there  were,  by  the 
instigation  of  the  devil,  parties  in  religion,  and  it 
was  said  among  different  people,  ^  I  am  of  Paul,  and 
I  of  ApoUos,  and  I  of  Cephas,'  the  churches  were 
governed  by  the  joint  counsel  of  the  Presbyters.  But 
afterwards,  when  every  one  accounted  those  whom 
he  baptized  as  belonging  to  himself  and  not  to  Christ, 
it  was  decreed  throughout  the  whole  world  that  one 
chosen  from  among  the  Presbyters,  should  be  put 
over  the  rest,  and  that  the  whole  care  of  the  Church 
should  be  committed  to  him,  and  the  seeds  of  schisms 
taken  away. 

"Should  any  one  think  that  this  is  any  private 
opinion,  and  not  the  doctrine  of  the  Scriptures,  let 
him  read  the  words  of  the  Apostle  in  his  epistle  to 
the  Philippians:  "Paul  and  Timotheus,  the  servants 
of  Jesus  Christ,  to  all  the  saints  in  Christ  Jesus  which 

9* 


102  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

are  at  Philippi,  with  the  Bishops  and  Deacons,"  &c. 
Phihppi  is  a  single  city  of  Macedonia ;  and  certainly 
in  one  city  there  could  not  be  several  Bishops  as  they 
are  now  styled;  but  as  they,  at  that  time,  called  the 
very  same  persons  Bishops  whom  they  called  Pres- 
byters, the  Aposde  has  spoken  without  distinction  of 
Bishops  as  Presbyters. 

"  Should  this  matter  yet  appear  doubtful  to  any 
one,  unless  it  be  proved  by  an  additional  testimony ; 
it  is  written  in  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  that  when 
Paul  had  come  to  Miletum,  he  sent  to  Ephesus  and 
called  the  Presbyters  of  that  Church,  and  among 
other  things  said  to  them,  '  take  heed  to  yourselves 
and  to  all  the  flock  in  which  the  Holy  Spirit  hath 
made  you  Bishops.'  Take  particular  notice,  that 
calling  the  Presbyters  of  the  single  city  of  Ephesus, 
he  afterwards  names  the  same  persons  Bishops." 
After  farther  quotations  from  the  Epistle  to  the  He- 
brews and  from  Peter,  he  proceeds:  "  Our  intention 
in  these  remarks  is  to  show,  that,  among  the  ancients, 
Presbyters  and  Bishops  were  the  very  same.  But 
that  BY  little  and  little,  that  the  plants  of  dissen- 
tions  might  be  phicked  up,  the  whole  concern  was 
devolved  upon  an  individual.  As  the  Presbyters, 
therefore,  know  that  they  are  subjected,  by  the  cus- 
tom OF  the  church,  to  him  who  is  set  over  them,  so 
let  the  Bishops  know,  that  they  are  greater  than  Pres- 
byters MORE  BY  CUSTOM,  than  by  any  real  appoint- 
ment OF  Christ." 

He  pursues  the  same  argument,  with  great  point, 
in  his  famous  Epistle  to  Evagrius,  asserting  and  prov- 
ing from  the  Scriptures,  that  in  the  beginning  and 
during  the  Apostles'  days,  a  Bishop  and  a  Presbyter 
were  the  same  thing.     He  then  goes  on :  "^As  to  the 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  103 

fact  that  afterwards^  one  was  elected  to  preside 
over  the  rest,  this  was  done  as  a  remedy  against 
schism ;  lest  every  one  drawing  his  proselytes  to  him- 
self, should  rend  the  Church  of  Christ.  For  even  at 
Alexandria,  from  the  Evangelist  Mark  to  the  Bishops 
Heraclas  and  Dionysius,  the  Presbyters  always  chose 
one  of  their  number,  placed  him  in  a  superior  station 
and  gave  him  the  title  of  Bishop :  in  the  same  man- 
ner as  if  an  army  should  make  an  Emperor;  or  the 
Deacons  should  choose  from  among  themselves,  one 
whom  they  knew  to  be  particularly  active,  and  should 
call  him  Arch-deacon.  For  excepting  ordination, 
what  is  done  by  a  Bishop  that  may  not  be  done  by  a 
Presbyter?" 

"  Here,"  observes  Dr.  Mason,  "  is  an  account  of 
the  origin  and  progress  of  Episcopacy,  by  a  Father 
whom  the  Episcopalians  themselves  admit  to  have 
been  the  most  able  and  learned  man  of  his  age ;  and 
how  contradictory  it  is  to  their  account,  the  reader 
will  be  at  no  loss  to  perceive,  when  he  shall  have 
followed  us  through  an  analysis  of  its  several  parts. 

1.  Jerome  expressly  denies  the  superiority  of  Bish- 
ops to  Presbyters  by  divine  right.  To  prove  his  as- 
sertion on  this  head  he  goes  directly  to  the  Scriptures; 
and  argues,  as  the  advocates  of  parity  do,  from  the 
interchangeabte  /zY/e^  of  Bishop  and  Presbyter;  from 
the  directions  given  to  them  without  the  least  inti- 
mation of  difference  in  their  authority ;  and  from  the 
powers  of  Presbyters,  undisputed  in  his  day.  It  is 
very  true  that  the  reasoning  from  names  is  said  by 
those  whom  it  troubles,  to  be  "  miserable  sophistry" 
and  "  good  for  nothing."  But  as  Jerome  advances  it 
with  the  utmost  confidence,  they  might  have  forborne 
such  a  compliment  to  "  the  prince  of  divines"  in  the 


104  .  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

fourth  century;  especially  as  none  of  his  contempo- 
raries, so  far  as  we  recollect,  even  attempted  to 
answer  it.  It  is  a  little  strange  that  laymen  and 
clergymen,  deacons,  priests,  and  bishops,  should  all 
he  silenced  by  a  page  of"  miserable  sophistry." 

2.  Jerome  states  it  as  a  historical  fact,  that  in  the 
original  constitution  of  the  Church,  before  the  devil 
had  as  much  influence  as  he  acquired  afterwards,  the 
Churches  were  governed  by  the  joint  counsel  of  the 
Presbyters. 

3.  Jerome  states  it  as  a  historical  fact,  that  this 
government  of  the  Churches  by  Presbyters  alone, 
continued  until,  for  the  avoiding  of  scandalous  quar- 
rels and  schisms,  it  was  thought  expedient  to  alter  it. 
''Afterwards^''  says  he,  "when  every  one  accounted 
those  whom  he  baptized  as  belonging  to  himself  and 
not  to  Christ,  it  was  decreed  throughout  the  whole 
wo7dd,  that  one  chosen  from  among  the  Presbyters 
should  be  put  over  the  rest,  and  that  the  whole  care 
of  the  Church  should  be  committed  to  him." 

4.  Jerome  states  it  as  a  historical  fact,  that  this 
change  in  the  government  of  the  Church — this  crea- 
tion of  a  superior  order  of  ministers,  took  place,  not 
at  once,  but  by  degrees — "  Paulatim,"  says  he,  "  by 
little  and  little."  The  precise  date  on  which  this  in- 
novation upon  primitive  order  commenced,  he  does 
not  mention;  but  he  says  positively  that  it  did  not 
take  place  till  the  factious  spirit  of  the  Corinthians  had 
spread  itself  in  different  countries  to  an  alarming  ex- 
tent. "  In  j)opulis,^^  is  his  expression.  Assuredly 
this  was  not  the  work  of  a  day.  .  .  The  progress  of 
the  mischief  was  gradual,  and  so,  according  to  Jerome, 
was  the  progress  of  the  remedy  which  the  wisdom  of 
the  times  devised.     We  agree  with  them  who  think 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  105 

that  the  experiment   introduced  more   evil  than  it 
banished. 

5.  Jerome  states  as  historical  facts,  that  the  eleva- 
tion of  one  Presbyter  over  the  others,  was  a  human 
contrivance; — was  not  imposed  by  authority,  but 
crept  in  by  custom; — and  that  the  Presbyters  of  his 
day  kneiu  this  very  well.  .^5,  therefore,  says  he,  the 
Presbyters  know  that  they  are  subjected  to  their 
superior  by  custom;  so  let  the  Bishops  know  that 
they  are  above  the  Presbyters,  rather  by  the  custom 
OF  THE  Church,  than  by  the  Lord's  appointment. 

6.  Jerome  states  it  as  a  historical  fact,  that  the 
first  Bishops  were  made  by  the  Presbyters  them- 
selves; and  consequently  they  could  neither  have  nor 
communicate  any  authority  above  that  of  Presbyters. 
"  Aflerwards,^^  says  he,  "  to  prevent  schism,  one  was 
elected  to  preside  over  the  rest."  Elected  and  com- 
missioned by  whom?  By  the  Presbyters:  for  he 
immediately  gives  you  a  broad  fact  which  it  is  impos- 
sible to  explain  away.  ^At  Alexandria,'  he  tells 
you,  <from  the  Evangelist  Mark  to  the  Bishops  Her- 
aclas  and  Dionysius,'  i.  e.  till  about  the  middle  of  the 
third  century,  Uhe  Presbyters  always  chose  one  of 
their  number,  placed  him,  in  a  superior  station  and 
gave  him  the  title  of  Bishop. ^  " 

Finally,  Jerome  states  that  even  in  his  time,  i.  e. 
toward  the  end  of  the  fourth  century,  there  was  no 
power  excepting  ordination,  exercised  by  a  Bishop 
which  might  not  be  exercised  by  a  Presbyter.  "  What 
does  a  Bishop,"  he  asks,  "excepting  ordination, 
which  a  Presbyter  may  not  do  ?"  Notwithstanding 
the  innovations  he  describes,  had  already  been  made, 
and  Episcopacy  introduced,  (as  a  remedy  for  schism !) 
yet  even  in  his  time  the   new  order  of  things  was 


106  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

not  wholly  established.  Ordination  had  been  given 
up  to  the  Bishops,  but  the  Presbyters  had  not  sur- 
rendered entirely  the  right  o{ jurisdiction,  nor  indeed 
any  other  right.  They  afterwards  lost  even  this  mea- 
sure of  independence.  They  were  obliged  to  suc- 
cumb to  the  Bishops,  as  the  Bishops,  in  turn,  were  to 
the  Metropolitans  and  Patriarchs,  and  these,  at  last, 
to  the  Pope. 

Having  quoted  this  lucid  and  instructive  account  of 
the  origin  of  Diocesan  Episcopacy,  I  resume  the  line 
of  my  argument  on  the  Apostolical  Succession.  The 
first  two  propositions  which  were  laid  down  (see  p. 
45,)  as  comprising  the  High-Church  theory,  have 
been  examined,  and,  I  think  I  may  add,  disproved. 
If  they  fall,  the  remaining  proposition,  to  wit:  that 
"  THE  Episcopal  Bishops  are  the  true  and  only 
SUCCESSORS  of  THE  APOSTLES,"  falls  with  them.  It 
may  be  satisfactory,  however,  to  show  that  this 
scheme  derives  as  little  support  from  History  as  it 
does  from  the  word  of  God. 

The  doctrine  is,  it  will  be  remembered,  not  simply 
that  the  Christian  ministry  as  a  standing  order  of  men, 
has  been  preserved  in  the  Church  from  the  Apostolic 
age  to  the  present  time,  but  that  there  has  been  dur- 
ing this  whole  period  a  personal  succession  of  Jlpos- 
tles  or  Prelates  in  an  unbroken  line;  that  each  Apos- 
tle or  Bishop  has  received,  in  his  consecration  a  mys- 
terious "  gift,"  and  also  transmits  to  every  priest  in 
his  ordination  a  mysterious  "gift,"  indicated  in  the 
respective  offices  by  the  awful  words,  "  Receive  the 
Holy  Ghost ;"  that  Bishops  once  consecrated  are  in- 
vested with  the  remarkable  property  of  transmitting 
the  «^  gift"  to  others;  that  this  has  been  the  case  from 
the  primitive  age  till  now,  so  that  the  Bishops  of  our 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  107 

day  have  received  the  gift  in  question,  by  transmis- 
sion through  an  unbroken  series  of  Prelates,  from  the 
Apostles.  On  this  succession,  let  it  be  distinctly  noted, 
High-Churchmen  suspend  the  validity  of  the  orders 
of  their  clergy  at  the  present  day  and  the  very  exist- 
ence of  the  Church. 

"  There  is  no  other  way  left,"  says  Bishop  Sea- 
bury,  (whose  own  orders,  by  the  way,  will  hereafter 
be  shown  to  have  been  invalid,)  to  obtain  a  valid  com- 
mission to  act  as  Christ's  ministers  in  his  Church  but 
by  an  uninterrupted  succession  of  ordinations  from 
the  Apostles.  Where  this  is  wanting,  all  spiritual 
power  in  Christ's  Church  is  wanting  also."^  "  Such 
then,"  observes  another  American  clergyman  of  the 
Episcopal  Church,  "is  the  uninterrupted  succession, — 
a  fact  to  which  every  Bishop,  Priest,  and  Deacon  in 
the  wide  world,  looks  as  the  ground  of  validity  in 
his  orders.  Without  this,  all  distinction  between  a 
clergyman  and  a  layman,  is  utterly  vain,  for  no  secu- 
rity exists  that  heaven  will  ratify  the  acts  of  an  ille- 
gally constituted  minister  on  earth.  Without  it,  ordi- 
nation confers  none  but  humanly  derived  powers; 
and  what  these  are  worth,  the  reader  may  estimate 
when  we  tell  him,  that  on  proof  of  a  real  fracture  in 
the  line  of  transmission  between  the  first  Bishops  of 
the  American  Church  and  the  inspired  Apostles,  the 
present  Bishops  will  freely  acknowledge  themselves 
to  be  mere  laymen,  and  humbly  retire  from  their 
posts. "2 

If,  then,  it  can  be  proved  that  there  has  been  no 
such  unbroken  personal  succession  of  Apostles  or 
Prelates,  from  the  Apostolic  age — if  it  can  be  shown 

>  Cited  by  Dr.  Smyth. 

2  Staunton's  Diet,  of  the  Church.  (Id.) 


108  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

either  that  the  chain  is  not  fastened  at  its  alleged 
commencement,  or  Xhvii  one  solitary  link  is  wanting — 
it  will  follow,  on  their  principles,  that  the  ivhole 
Episcopal  clergy  of  the  present  day  are  ivithout 
orders,  that  their  Church  is  no  Cliurch,  that  their 
ordinances  are  invalid,  that  they  and  their  children 
have  never  been  baptized,  that  they  have  never  really 
partaken  of  the  Lord's  Sapper,  that  they  have  no 
interest  in  the  promises,  and  that,  as  to  their  salvation, 
they  are  left  to  God's  "  iincovenanted  mercies!" 
These  consequences,  I  say,  must,  on  High-Church 
principles,  (not  on  ours)  inevitably  follow,  if  a  single 
flaw  can  be  detected  in  the  chain  of  succession  be- 
tween the  Apostles  and  the  Bishops  of  our  day.  In- 
telligent Episcopalians  must  judge  for  themselves  of  a 
theory  which  rests  the  being  of  their  Church  and  the 
salvation  of  their  souls  upon  a  basis  like  this. 

The  first  thing  essential  to  make  out  this  scheme, 
is,  to  prove  that  the  Apostles  appointed  successors  in 
the  Apostolic  office.  We  do  not  ask  for  proof  that 
they  appointed  successors ;  for  it  is  as  much  our 
belief  as  it  is  that  of  Prelatists,  that  a  permanent 
ministry  was  instituted  by  our  Saviour.  But  the 
point  to  be  established,  is,  that  the  line  of  Apostles 
was  to  be  perpetuated — that  their  successors  were  to 
be,  not  Presbyters  of  co-equal  rank  and  authority, 
but  officers  clothed  with  the  powers  of  the  Apostle- 
ship.  It  is  undeniable  that  many  of  the  most  learned 
Episcopal  divines  have  acknowledged  that  there  is  no 
adequate  proof  of  a  succession  of  this  kind.  The 
least  uncertainty,  however,  is  fatal  to  the  doctrine.  A 
bare  doubt  discredits  the  entire  theory.  'In  the  mat- 
ter of  my  salvation,  I  cannot  trust  to  mere  probabili- 
ties and  conjectures.     I  am  told  (I  put  the  case  as  an 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  109 

Episcopalian,)  that  my  salvation  is  suspended  upon 
my  receiving  the  ordinances  at  the  hands  of  a  Minis- 
ter who  can  trace  up  his  official  descent  through  an 
unbroken  line  of  Prelates  to  the  Apostles.  I  ask  for 
the  evidence  that  the  Apostles  appointed  successors, 
and  you  lay  before  me  proofs  which  have  been  re- 
jected as  unsatisfactory  even  by  many  of  the  ablest 
divines  of  my  own  Church.  I  demand  clear  and  de- 
cisive scriptural  authority,  and  you  put  me  off  with 
what,  on  the  most  favourable  construction,  amounts 
to  nothing  more  than  a  faint  probability — and  that, 
in  reference  to  the  very  first  links  of  the  pretended 
succession.  Surely,  you  cannot  expect  me  to  peril 
my  salvation  on  a  scheme  like  this.'  If  High-Church- 
men would  remove  this  difficulty,  they  vimsX,  prove  by 
convincing  arguments  from  Scripture  and  history,  that 
the  Apostles  were  succeeded  by  Apostles.  This  alone 
can  allay  the  fears  of  Episoopahans  who  are  alarmed 
lest  the  chain  they  are  clinging  to  may  not  be  fastened 
to  the  Rock.  If  they  are  unable  to  do  this,  they  can 
do  nothing  to  the  purpose.  It  will  be  of  no  avail 
simply  to  show  that  the  Apostles  appointed  ministers 
to  succeed  them.  Claiming,  as  the  Prelates  do,  to  be 
the  "heirs  and  representatives  of  the  Apostles,"  they 
must  prove  that  the  line  of  succession  was  one  along 
which  the  powers  and  prerogatives  of  the  Apostleship 
would  run,  that  is,  a  line  of  Apostles.  If  they  fail  in 
this,  the  defect  is  irremediable. 

This,  however,  is  but  a  very  small  part  of  the  task 
imposed  upon  the  advocates  of  this  theory.  After 
proving  that  the  Apostles  appointed  successors,  to 
whom  they  imparted  the  "gift  of  the  Holy  Ghost," 
and  whom  they  clothed  with  the  entire  oversight  and 
control  of  the  Church,  they  must  be  able  to  show  that 

10 


110  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

the  subsequent  links  in  this  chain  are  all  sound — that 
no  break  has  occurred  either  from  inehgibiUty  on*  tiie 
part  of  a  candidate,  uncanonical  ordination,  or  any 
other  cause.  This  requisition  is  usually  met  by  the 
complacent  exhibition  of  a  catalogue  of  naiiies,  pur- 
porting to  be  a  list  of  Prelates  extending  from  the 
Apostles  down  to  the  Bishops  who  now  preside  over 
the  Church  of  England  and  the  Episcopal  Church  in 
this  country.  These  catalogues  are  published  in  book 
and  pamphlet  form  for  general  circulation.  They 
have  no  doubt  been  quite  conclusive,  with  people  of  a 
certain  grade  of  intellect  and  intelligence,  as  to  the 
supposed  Apostolic  lineage  of  the  present  race  of  Pre- 
lates,— with  all,  indeed,  who  agree  with  the  tract 
writers  that  it  is  "better  to  believe  than  to  reason''  on 
such  subjects.  But  those  who  are  so  unreasonable 
as  not  to  be  willing  to  believe  without  evidence,  will 
be  disposed  to  go  behind  the  catalogues  and  examine 
the  materials  of  which  they  are  composed. 

The  first  observation  to  be  made  in  reference  to 
these  lists,  and  the  theory  they  are  designed  to  estab- 
lish, is,  that  no  argument  in  support  of  the  High- 
Church  doctrine  of  the  Apostohcal  Succession,  can  be 
drawn  from  the  mere  fact  that  certain  individuals,  or 
series  of  individuals,  are  styled  ^^  Bishojjs^'  by  the 
early  ecclesiastical  writers.  That  doctrine  assumes 
that  Bishops  are  of  a  superior  order  to  Presbyters — 
that,  in  fact,  they  are  Apostles,  and,  as  such,  clothed 
with  the  functions  and  prerogatives  of  the  original 
Apostles.  But  even  High-Church  writers  concede, 
as  has  been  shown,  that  the  titles.  Bishop  and  Pres- 
byter, are  used  in  the  New  Testament  interchange- 
ably, and  that  all  that  the  New  Testament  contains 
on  the  subject  of  Bishops,  pertains  to  what  is  now 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  Ill 

made  the  second  order,  viz.,  Presbyters.  It  is  no  less 
certain  that  these  titles  were  used  interchangeably  by 
the  early  fathers.  ^  That  Prelacy  soon  began  to  dis- 
close itself  after  the  death  of  the  Apostles,  and  was, 
with  various  other  liuman  inventions  in  the  Church, 
pretty  fully  developed  when  the  empire  embraced 
Christianity  under  Constantino  the  Great,  in  the  fourth 
century,  is  not  denied.  But  this  does  not  enervate 
the  presumptian  that  the  "  Bishops"  whom  we  meet 
with  in  the  second  and  third  centuries  were  parochial^ 
not  diocesan,  Bishops.  The  testimony  of  Jerome, 
given  a  few  pages  back,  is  conclusive  on  this  point. 
If  further  confirmation  of  it  were  needed,  it  might  be 
found  in  a  fact  which  is  incompatible  with  any  theory 
that  assumes  the  Apostolic  origin  of  Episcopacy;  I 
mean,  the  great  number  of  Bishops  in  the  early 
Church.  Bingham  states,  that  in  «^Asia  Minor,  a 
tract  of  land  not  much  larger  than  the  isle  of  Great 
Britain,  there  were  about  four  hundred  Bishops.'^ 
Bishop  Burnet  mentions  that  at  a  conference  between 
Augustine  and  the  Donatists,  in  Africa,  about  the 
year  410,  there  were  present  between  five  and  six 
hundred  Bishops  from,  as  it  would  seem,  a  single 
province.  And,  according  to  Victor  Uticensis,  a 
writer  of  the  fifth  century,  "from  that  part  of  Africa 
in  which  the  Vandalic  persecution  raged,  six  hundred 
and  sixty  Bishops  fled,  besides  a  great  number  that 
were  murdered  and  imprisoned,  and  many  more  who 
were  tolerated." — One  must  be  a  pretty  resolute  Pre- 
latist  not  to  be  willing  to  admit  that  these  bishops 
could  only  have  been  parish  ministers.  Indeed,  if 
there  is  any  one  fact  that  can  be  demonstrated  from 

>  Sec  the  passages  collated  by  Dr.  Miller,   Dr.  Smyth,  and   other 
Presbyterian  writers. 


112  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

the  records  of  Christian  antiquity,  it  is,  that  the  Bishop 
of  those  days  was  the  hisliop  of  only  one  church. 
This  is  conchisively  estabhshed  by  Sir  Peter  King  in 
his  work  on  the  Primitive  Church.  In  that  work  he 
shows  (ell.  ii.)  that  ^' there  was  hut  one  Church  to  a 
bis  hop. ^^     In  proof  of  this  he  states,  that 

1.  "The  ancient  dioceses  are  never  said  to  con- 
tain churches,  but  only  a  church?^  "  As  for  the 
word  dioceses,"  he  says,  "by  which  the  bishop's  flock 
is  now  expressed,  I  do  not  remember  that  ever  I 
found  it  used  in  this  sense  by  any  of  the  ancients,'' 

2.  "All  the  people- of  a  diocess  did  every  Sunday 
meet  all  together  in  one  place  to  celebrate  divine 
service. 

3.  "  The  bishop  had  but  one  altar  or  communion- 
table in  his  whole  diocess.  So  writes  Cyprian:  'We 
celebrate  the  sacrament,  the  whole  brotherhood  being 
present.' 

4.  "  The  other  sacrament  of  baptism  was  generally 
administered  by  the  bishops  alone  within  their  respec- 
tive dioceses. 

5.  "  The  church's  charity  was  deposited  with  the 
bishop,  who,  as  Justin  Martyr  reports,  was  '  the 
common  curator  and  overseer  of  aJl  the  orphans, 
widows,  diseased,  strangers,  imprisoned,  and,  in  a 
word,  of  all  those  that  were  needy  and  indigent.' 

6.  "  All  the  people  of  a  diocess  were  present  at 
church-censures. 

7.  "No  offenders  were  restored  again  to  the  church's 
peace,  without  the  knowledge  and  consent  of  the 
whole  diocess. 

8.  "'  When  the  bishop  of  a  church  was  dead,  all  the 
people  of  that  church  met  together  in  one  place  to 
choose  a  new  bishop. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  113 

9.  "  At  the  ordioation  of  the  clergy,  the  whole  body 
of  the  people  were  present." 

From  these  and  many  other  facts  he  mentions,  the 
learned  chancellor,  with  good  reason,  concludes  that 
a  primitive  diocess  corresponded  to  a  modern  parish, 
and  that  a  primitive  bishop  was  the  bishop  of  only 
a  single  church. 

When,  therefore,  we  are  told  that  the  ecclesiastical 
historian,  Eusebius,  who  lived  in  the  fourth  century, 
and  to  whom,  almost  exclusively,  Prelatists  are  in- 
debted for  the  catalogues  of  Bishops,  from  the  days 
of  the  Apostles  to  his  own,  (between  two  and  three 
hundred  years,)  when  we  are  told  that  Eusebius 
speaks  of  Bishops  as  being  superior  to  Presbyters 
in  his  time,  and  that  he  has  preserved  lists  of  the 
Bishops  in  the  order  of  succession  after  the  Apostles, 
we  are  tempted  to  ask,  with  the  venerable  Dr.  Miller, 
"  Does  Eusebius  say  that  the  Bishops  of  his  day  were 
a. different  orr/er  from  the  Presbyters?  Does  he  de- 
clare that  there  was  a  superiority  of  order  vested  in 
Bishops  by  divine  appointment?  Does  he  assert 
that  Bishops  in  the  days  of  the  Apostles  and  for  a 
century  afterwards,  were  the  sam,e  kind  of  officers 
with  those  who  were  called  by  the  same  title  in  the 
fourth  century  ?  Does  he  tell  us  that  this  superior 
order  of  clergy  were  the  only  ecclesiastical  officers 
who  were  allowed,  in  his  day,  to  ordain  and  con- 
firm? I  have  never  met  with  a  syllable  of  all  this  in 
Eusebius.  All  that  can  be  gathered  from  him,  is, 
that  there  were  persons  called  Bishops  in  the  days 
of  the  Apostles;  that  there  had  been  a  succession  of 
Bishops  in  the  Church  from  the  Apostles  to  the  fourth 
century  when  he  lived;  and  that,  in  his  day,  there 
was  a  distinction  between  Bishops  and  other  Pres- 

10^ 


114  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

byters."  All  which  may  be  admitted  without  the 
least  detriment  to  our  argument,  or  the  slightest 
benefit  to  the  High-Church  theory.  To  make  Euse- 
bius  an  available  witness  for  them,  they  are  obliged 
to  assume  the  very  point  on  which  we  are  at  issue, 
viz.,  that  the  individuals  styled  Bishops,  in  the  early 
ages,  were  Diocesan  Bishops — an  assumption  as 
legitimate  as  would  be  that  of  an  Oriental  Prelatist, 
who,  on  looking  over  an  itinerant  copy  of  the  Min- 
utes of  our  last  General  Assembly,  and  finding  the 
word  "Bishops''  at  the  top  of  the  column  containing 
the  names  of  the  clerical  members,  should  infer  from 
this  circumstance,  that  there  were  one  hundred  dio- 
cesan Bis  flops  in  that  Assembly,  and  that  our  Chnrch 
was  governed  by  Prelates.  Even  admitting,  then, 
the  correctness  of  the  catalogues  furnished  by  this 
historian,  it  still  remains  to  be  proved  that  all  his 
Bishops  were  Prelates  and  not  Presbyter-bishops. 

But  let  us,  in  the  next  place,  see  what  account  Eu- 
sebius  gives  us  of  these  pretended  catalogues,  and 
ascertain  whether  he  placed  that  implicit  confidence 
in  them  which  ive  must  do  before  we  can  suspend 
our  salvation  upon  their  genuineness.  So  far  is  this 
early  historian  from  speaking  on  this  subject  in  the 
positive  manner  so  characteristic  of  modern  High- 
Churchmen,  that  in  the  beginning  of  his  work  he 
craves  the  indulgence  of  his  readers,  as  one  who 
is  "  attempting  a  kind  of  h^ackless  and  unbeaten 
path.''^  "We  are  totally  unable  to  find  even  the  bare 
vestiges  of  those  who  may  have  travelled  the  way 
before  us;  unless,  perhaps,  what  is  only  presented  in 
the  slight  intimations,  which  some  in  different  ways 
have  transmitted  to  us  in  certain  partial  narratives 
of  the  times  in  which  they  lived ;  who,  raising  their 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  115 

voices  before  us,  like  torches  at  a  distance,  and  as 
looking  down  from  some  commanding  height,  call 
out  and  exhort  us  where  we  should  walk  and  whith- 
er direct  our  course  with  certainty  and  safety."  ^ 
Accordingly,  his  account  of  the  labours  of  the  Apos- 
tles themselves  is  so  defective,  that  he  is  able  to 
mention  the  parts  of  the  world  where  most  of  them 
preached  the  Gospel,  only  by  tradition  and  hear- 
say.^ In  relation  to  their  immediate  successors  also, 
he  frankly  acknowledges  that  he  can  name  them 
only  by  rumour.  Thus  of  the  important  Church  of 
Jerusalem,  he  says^  "  the  rejjort  is'^  that  Simeon 
was  elected  Bishop  after  the  martyrdom  of  James. 
And  as  to  the  subsequent  successions  in  that  Church, 
he  afterwards  says,  "  JVe  have  not  ascertained,  in 
any  way,  that  the  times  of  the  Bishops  in  Jeru- 
salem have  been  regularly  preserved  on  record,  for 
TRADITION  says  that  they  all  lived  but  a  very  short 
time.'^^  No  less  candid  is  he,  and,  1  may  add,  no 
less  conclusive  in  his  testimony  against  the  Prelatic 
pretensions  of  our  times,  in  reference  to  the  succes- 
sors of  Peter  and  Paul.  I  give  the  passage  with  Stil- 
lingfleet's  comments.  "Who  dare  with  confidence 
believe  the  conjectures  of  Eusebius  at  three  hundred 
years  distance  from  apostolical  times,  when  he  hath 
no  other  testimony  to  vouch,  but  the  hypotheses  of 
an  uncertain  Clement,  (certainly  not  he  of  Alexan- 
dria, if  Joseph  Scaliger  may  be  credited,)  and  the  com- 
mentaries of  Hegesippus,  whose  relations  and  author- 
ity are  as  questionable  as  many  of  the  reports  of 
Eusebius  himself  are  in  reference  to  those  elder 
times:  for  which  I  need  no  other  testimony  but  Eu- 

iBookl.  Ch.  I.  Mbid.Ch.  11. 

2ibid.  III.  Ch.  1.  4  Ibid.  IV.  Ch.  5. 


116  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

sebius  in  a  place  enough  of  itself  to  blast  the  whole 
credit  of  antiquity,  as  to  the  matter  now  in  debate. 
For  speaking  of  Paul  and  Peter,  and  the  churches 
by  them  planted,  and  coming  to  inquire  after  their 
successors,  he  makes  this  very  ingenuous  confession : 
*  There  being  so  many  of  them,  and  some  naturally 
rivals,  it  is  not  easy  to  say  Avhich  of  them  were  ac- 
counted eligible  to  govern  the  churches  established, 
unless  it  be  those  that  Ave  may  select   out  of  the  wri- 
tings of  Paul'   (Book  III.  ch.  4.)     Say  you  so  ?    Is  it 
so   hard   a   matter  to   find   out  who   succeeded  the 
Apostles  in  the  churches  planted  by  them,  unless  it  be 
those  mentioned  in  the  writings  of  Paul?     What  be- 
comes, then,  of  our  unquestionable  line  of  succession 
of  the  Bishgps  of  several  churches,  and  the  large  dia- 
grams made  of  the  apostolical  churches  with  every 
one's  name  set  down  in  his  order,  as  if  the  writer  had 
been  Clarenceaiilx  to  the  Apostles  themselves  ?     Is 
it  come  to  this,  at  last,  that  we  have  nothing  certain 
but  what  we  have  in  Scriptures?     And  must  then 
the  tradition  of  the  Church  be  our  rule  to  interpret 
Scriptures  by?     An  excellent  way  to  find   out   the 
truth  doubtless,  to  bend  the  rule  to  the  crooked  stick, 
to  make  the  judge  stand  to  the  opinion  of  his  lacquey, 
what  sentence  he  shall  pass  upon  the  cause  in  ques- 
tion ;  to  make  Scripture  stand  cap  in  hand  to  tradi- 
tion, to  know  whether  it  may  have  liberty  to  speak 
or  not !     Are  all  the  great  outcries  of  apostolical  tra- 
dition, of  personal  succession,  of  unquestionable  re- 
cords, resolved  at  last  into  the  Scripture  itself  by  him 
from   whom  all  these   long  pedigrees  are   fetched? 
Then  let  succession  know  its  place,  and  learn  to  vaile 
bonnet  to  the  Scriptures.     And,  witlial,  let  men  take 
heed  of  over- reaching  themselves  where  they  would 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  117 

bring  down  so  large  a  catalogue  of  single  Bishops 
from  the  first  and  purest  times  of  the  Church  ;  for  it 
will  be  hard  for  others  to  believe  them,  when  Euse- 
bins  professeth  it  is  so  hard  to  Jind  them.''^ 

This  view  of  the  inextricable  confusion  in  which 
the  whole  subject  of  the  early  successions  is  involved, 
will  be  confirmed,  if  we  advert  more  particularly  to 
the  cases  of  two  or  three  of  the  leading  Churches. 
Take,  for  example,  the  Church  of  Ephesus.  The 
second  link  in  the  succession  here,  according  to  Prel- 
atists,  is  Timothy.  His  claim  to  the  diocese  has 
been  so  fully  investigated,  that  we  need  not  spend 
any  more  time  upon  it.  But,  allowing  that  Timothy 
was  Apostle  or  Bishop  of  Ephesus,  who  were  his 
successors  ?  This  question  is  answered  by  the  exhi- 
bition of  a  catalogue  of  twenty-seven  reputed  Bishops 
of  this  Church,  which  catalogue  rests  entirely  on  the 
authority  of  one  Leontius,  Bishop  of  Magnesia,  who 
lived  about  four  hundred  years  after  the  time  of  the 
Apostles.  This  I.eontius,  in  the  Council  of  Chalce- 
don,  made  this  statement :  "  From  Timothy  to  this 
day  there  hath  been  a  succession  of  seven  and  twenty 
Bishops,  all  of  them  ordained  in  Ephesus."  The 
latter  part  of  this  statement,  however,  was  promptly 
denied  in  the  Council  by  Philip  a  Presbyter  of 
Constantinople,  and  was  also  disproved  by  Actius, 
arch-deacon  of  Constantinople.  And  Stillingfleet  has 
aptly  observed,  that  "  if  the  certainty  of  succession 
relies  on  the  credit  of  Leontius,  they  may  thank  the 
Council  of  Chalcedon,  who  have  sufficiently  blasted 
it,  by  determining  the  cause  against  him  in  the  main 
evidence  produced  by  him." 

Take,  as  another  example,  the  Church  of  Antioch. 

'  Irenicum,  Ch.  VI. 


118  THE    HIGH-CIIURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

Eiisebiiis,  Chrysostom,  Jerome,  Pope  Leo,  Innocent, 
Gelasius,  and  Gregory  the  Great,  all  tell  ns  that  this 
Church  was  founded  by  Peter.  Let  us  see  how  this 
agrees  with  Scripture.  We  are  told.  Acts  xi.  19,  that 
"they  which  were  scattered  abroad  upon  the  perse- 
cution which  arose  about  Stephen,  travelled  as  far  as 
Phoenice,  and  Cyprus,  and  Antioch^  preaching  the 
word  to  the  Jews,"  &c.  It  was  upon  this  occasion, 
then,  that  Christianity  was  first  planted  in  Antioch. 
Subsequently  Barnabas,  and  after  him,  Paul  went 
thither ;  and  these  tAvo  remained  there  for  a  whole 
year.  So  that  Paul  was  rather  the  founder  of  this 
Church,  than  Peter,  who,  notwithstanding  the  posi- 
tive assertion  of  Chrysostom  and  others,  that  he  was 
the  founder  and  for  a  long  time  the  Bishop  of  the 
Church,  did  not  according  to  the  New  Testament, 
even  visit  Antioch  until  after  the  council  at  Jerusa- 
lem. Then,  as  to  the  succession,  Baronius  assures 
us  that  the  Apostles  left  two  Bishops  behind  them  in 
this  place,  one  for  the  Jews,  the  other  for  the  Gen- 
tiles. Bat  what,  then,  becomes  of  the  unity  of  the 
Episcopate?  Not  to  press  this  embarrassing  ques- 
tion, however,  who  were  these  two  Bishops  ?  Baro- 
nius answers,  they  Avere  Ignatius  and  Euodias.  Eu- 
sebius  says  expressly,  that  Euodias  was  the  first 
Bishop  of  Antioch,  and  that  Ignatius  succeeded  him. 
On  the  other  hand,  Chrysostom,  Theodoret,  and  the 
author  of  the  Constitutions  declare,  with  equal  con- 
fidence, that  Peter  and  Paul  both  laid  their  hands  on 
Ignatius;  but,  unfortunately,  it  appears  that  Peter 
was  dead  before  Ignatius  was  Bishop  in  this  place.' 
Is  the  chain  of  succession  from  Antioch^  strong  enough 
to  sustain  all  that  Prelatists  would  hang  upon  it? 

1  VideCalamy's  Defence  of  Moderate  Non-Conformity,  vol.  i.  pp.  165-9. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  119 

Let  US  turn  next  to  Rome.  Here,  if  any  where, 
we  may  expect  to  find  the  succession  clear  and  indis- 
putable.. If  this  chain  gives  way,  the  Romish  and 
Anglican  Churches,  and  the  Episcopal  Church  in  this 
country,  must  all  relinquish  their  claim  to  be  regard- 
ed as  Churches ;  for  to  this  they  are  suspended.  The 
theory  is  that  Peter  was  the  first  Bishop  of  Rome. 
Now  there  is  no  satisfactory  evidence  that  Peter  was 
ever  at  Rome :  and  this  point  is  debated  among  the 
learned,  to  the  present  day.  In  the  next  place, 
allowing  him  to  have  been  at  Rome,  and  to  have 
resided  there  for  a  time,  there  is  no  evidence  that  he 
was  Bishoj)  of  Rome.  Many  of  the  most  eminent 
Episcopal  writers  have  held  with  Dr.  Barrow,  that  it 
would  have  been  derogatory  to  the  Apostles,  whose 
commission  embraced  the  world,  to  become  diocesan 
Bishops.  Speaking  of  the  very  question  under  con- 
sideration, Barrow  says,  it  would  have  been  as  great 
a  disparagement  to  the  Apostolical  majesty,  for  Peter 
to  have  taken  upon  himself  the  bishopric  of  Rome,  as 
it  would  be  for  the  King  to  become  Mayor  of  Lon- 
don, or  the  Bishop  of  London  to  become  the  vicar  of 
Pancras.  ^ 

But  allowing  for  the  sake  of  argument,  that  Peter 
was  Bishop  of  Rome,  who  were  his  successors  ?  One 
would  suppose  from  the  confidence  with  which  High- 
Churchmen  profess  to  be  able  to  trace  up  their  gene- 
alogy to  the  Apostles,  that  this  was  a  point  about 
which  there  was  no  difference  of  opinion.  So  remote 
is  this  from  the  truth,  however,  that  the  succession  at 
Rome  is,  to  use  StiUingfleet's  expressive  phrase,  "  as 
muddy  as  the  Tiber  itself.''^  Let  a  plain  man  who 
is  told  that  his  salvation  depends  upon  his  receiving 

'  On  the  Pope's  Supremacy,  p.  208. 


120  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

the  sacraments  at  the  hands  of  a  mhiister  who  can 
trace  up  his  ecclesiastical  lineage  to  the  Apostles 
through  an  unbroken  line  of  Prelates  or  Apostles, 
ponder  this  summary  of  opinions  about  the  Roman 
Succession.  "Some  will  have  Cletus  expunged  out 
of  the  table,  as  the  same  with  Anacletus;  and  so 
Linus  is  fixed  at  the  head  of  the  succession,  and  fol- 
lowed by  Anacletus  and  Clemens.  Thus  Irenaeus 
represents  it.  At  the  same  time  in  some  ancient  cata- 
logues, Anacletus  is  excluded;  and  he  is  not  at  this 
day  to  be  found  in  the  canon  of  the  mass:  and  yet 
the  Roman  Martyrology  speaks  distinctly  of  Cletus 
and  Anacletus  and  gives  a  very  different  account  of 
their  birth,  pontificate  and  martyrdom.  Epiphanius 
mentions  Cletus  but  omits  Anacletus.  He  puts  the 
first  Bishops  of  Rome,  in  this  order:  Peter  and  Paul, 
Linus,  Cletus,  Clemens,  and  Euaristus.  In  Bucher's 
catalogue  they  stand  thus :  Linus,  Cletus,  Clemens, 
and  Anacletus;  and  many  ancient  catalogues  agree; 
and  three  are  left  out,  viz.  Anicetus,  Eleutherius, 
and  Zephyrinus.  And  what  shall  we  do  with  the 
famous  Clement?  Does  he  style  himself  Bishop  of 
Rome?  Or  how  came  he  to  forget  his  title  ?  ^Tis 
said  by  some  that  after  he  had  been  St.  Paul's  com- 
panion, and  chosen  by  St.  Peter  to  be  Bishop  there, 
he  gave  place  to  Linus.  While  others  assert,  that 
Linus  and  Cletus  were  Bishops  at  the  same  time ; 
and  others,  Linus  and  Clemens.  TertuUian  and. 
Ruffinus  and  some  others  place  Clement  next  Peter. 
Irenaeus  and  Eusebius  set  Anacletus  before  him; 
Optatus,  both  Anacletus  and  Cletus:  and  Austin  and 
Damascus  make  Anacletus,  Cletus,  and  Linus,  all  to 
precede  him."^     This  is,  in  truth,  "  as  muddy  as  the 

1  Calamy,  Vol  I.  p.  172. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  121 

TiherP  And  who  can  clarify  it  ?  The  learning  and 
wisdom  both  of  the  ancients  and  the  moderns  have 
been  employed  upon  it,  and  with  no  other  result 
than  to  increase  the  turbidness  of  the  stream.  What- 
ever theory  of  the  succession  any  one  adopts,  he  will 
find  arrayed  against  him  writers  of  profound  erudi- 
tion and  high  authority.  The  question  is  one  on 
which  the  Fathers  differ  widely  among  themselves, 
and  the  best  historians  are  hopelessly-  at  variance 
with  one  another.  Nor  is  the  appropriate  order  of 
the  names,  the  only  point  involved  in  the  controversy. 
The  very  grave  question  is  raised  as  to  one  of  these 
names,  whether  such  an  individual  ever  existed. 
The  authorities  that  have  been  cited,  seem  about 
equally  divided  as  to  whether  CletUs  and  Anacletus 
were  two  individuals  or  one.  One  class  retain  them 
both ;  while  of  the  other,  some  discard  Cletus  from 
the  succession  as  a  mere  imaginary  personage,  and 
others  repudiate  Anacletus.  On  High-Church  princi- 
ples, let  it  be  remembered,  if  a  single  link  is  wanting, 
the  chain  is  destroyed  and  the  Church  annihilated. 
And  yet  here  is  a  point  in  the  chain  at  which  men  of 
equal  learning  and  ability  are  in  doubt  whether  there 
is  one  link  or  two  or  none  at  all. — We  have  only  be- 
gun, however,  to  point  out  the  difficulties  with  which 
this  scheme  is  encumbered. 

Even  if  we  could  be  certain — which  we  cannot 
be — that  all  the  individuals  named  in  the  pretended 
catalogues  of  Bishops  from  the  days  of  the  Apostles 
to  our  own,  actually  existed,  there  would  still  remain 
a  variety  of  questions  to  be  settled,  which,  as  to  a 
large  number  of  these  persons,  no  human  being  can 
answer.  Before  I  can  rest  my  hope  of  eternal  life 
upon  the  integrity  of  the  alleged  succession,  I  must 

H 


122  THE    HiaH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

have  explicit  information  respecting  every  individual 
named  in  the  Hst,  upon  these  points:  1.  Was  he 
eligible  to  the  Prelacy  or  Apostleship  ?  2.  Was  he 
properly  elected  or  appointed?  3.  Was  he  canoni- 
cally  ordained  and  consecrated?  4.  Were  these  seve- 
ral conditions  fulfilled  in  tlie  case  of  his  ordainers — 
that  is,  were  they,  at  the  period  of  their  several  ap- 
pointments, eligihle;  were  they  legally  chosen,  and 
canonically  ordained?  Let  no  Prelatist  reply,  that 
"  this  is  asking  too  much.'^  In  the  matter  of  my  sal- 
vation, I  am  not  to  be  put  off  with  mere  conjectures 
and  probabilities.  I  must  have  certainty.  .Since 
this  doctrine  of  the  succession  is  placed  on  an  equality 
with  the  doctrines  of  the  atonement,  justification 
through  the  righteousness  of  Christ,  and  regeneration, 
or  rather  enthroned  above  them,  I  require  the  same 
certainty  as  to  the  integrity  of  every  link  in  the  suc- 
cession, that  I  have  concerning  those  doctrines  as 
constituting  a  part  of  God's  revealed  word.  If  no- 
thing could  vitiate  the  succession  but  the  absence  of 
a  link — the  omission  to  consecrate  a  Bishop  at  any 
given  point  in  the  series — a  mere  unbroken  list  of 
names  duly  authenticated  might  suffice.  But,  on 
High-Church  principles,  there  are  many  circumstances 
which  are  to  be  regarded  as  disqualifying  for  the 
Episcopal  office.  The  following,  among  others,  are 
enumerated  by  canonists : — Being  unbaptized  (or 
having  only  lay-baptism;)  being  unordained,  or  not 
having  passed  through  the  subordinate  offices;  being 
unconsecrated;  being  consecrated  by  only  one  Bishop ; 
being  under  age;  having  obtained  the  see  by  Simony; 
being  ordained  by  the  Bishop  of  another  province; 
entertaining  heretical  opinions ;  being  addicted  to  gam- 
bling and  intoxication;  having  been  elected  by  force; 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  123 

and  others  such  Uke.i  What  I  demand,  is,  satisfac- 
tory historical  evidence  that  none  of  these  disquaU- 
fications  attach  to  a  single  individual  in  the  hst  of 
Bishops,  or  Apostles,  on  the  validity  of  which  I  am 
asked  to  stake  my  salvation.  If  a  single  link  be 
faulty,  the  sacramental  virtue  which,  it  is  alleged  is 
transmitted  along  the  line  of  the  Apostolical  Succes- 
sion, must  be  utterly  nullified  ever  after,  in  respect  of 
all  the  links  that  hang  on  that  one.  "For  if  a  Bishop 
has  not  been  duly  consecrated,  or,  had  hot  been  pre- 
viously rightly  ordained,  his  ordinations  are  null;  and 
so  are  the  ministrations  of  those  ordained  by  him;  and 
their  ordinations  of  others;  (supposing  any  of  the  per- 
sons ordained  by  him  to  attain  to  the  Episcopal  office) 
and  so  on,  without  end.  The  poisonous  faint  of  infor- 
mality, if  it  once  creep  in  undetected,  will  spread  the 
infection  of  nullity  to  an  indefinite  and  irremediable 
extent. 

"  And  who  can  undertake"  (the  argument  is  none 
the  worse  for  being  that  of  a  learned  and  very  able 
Jlrchbishop,^  now  living,)  "  to  pronounce  that  during 
that  long  period  usually  designated  as  the  Dark  Ages, 
no  such  taint  ever  was  introduced?  Irregularities 
could  not  have  been  wholly  excluded  without  a  per- 
petual miracle;  and  that  no  such  miraculous  inter- 
ference existed,  we  have  even  historical  proof.  Amidst 
the  numerous  corruptions  of  doctrine  and  of  practice, 
and  gross  superstitions,  that  crept  in  during  those 

1  Vide  AndreaB  Synops.  Juris  Canonici,  Lovanii,  1734.  Caranzae 
Summa  Conciliarum,  Duaci,  1679.  Beveregii  Pandectae  Canonutn 
S.  S.  Apostoll.  et  Concill.,  2  vols.  fol.  Oxon.  1672.  Justelli  Bibli- 
otheca  Juris  Canon.,  &c.,  2  vols.  fol.  Lutetiae,  1661.  (Cited  by  Mr. 
Lindsay  Alexander,  in  his  "  Anglo-Catholicism  not  Apostolical.") 

2  Dr.  Whateley,  Archbishop  of  Dublin. 


124  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

ages,  we  find  recorded  descriptions  not  only  of  the 
profound  ignorance  and  profligacy  of  life,  of  many  of 
the  clergy,  but  also  of  the  grossest  irregularities  in 
respect  of  discipline  and  form.  We  read  of  Bishops 
consecrated  when  mere  children; — of  men  officiating 
who  barely  knew  their  letters; — of  Prelates  expelled, 
and  others  put  into  their  places  by  violence; — of  illit- 
erate and  profligate  laymen,  and  habitual  drunkards 
admitted  to  holy  orders; — and,  in  short,  of  the  pre- 
valence of  every  kind  of  disorder,  and  reckless  dis- 
regard of  the  decency  which  the  Apostle  enjoins.  It 
is  inconceivable  that  any  one  even  moderately  ac- 
quainted with  history,  can  feel  a  certainty,  or  any 
approach  to  certainty,  that,  amidst  all  this  confusion 
and  corruption,  every  requisite  form  was,  in  everjr 
instance,  strictly  adhered  to,  by  men,  many  of  them 
openly  profane  and  secular,  unrestrained  by  public 
opinion,  through  the  gross  ignorance  of  the  popula- 
tion among  which  they  lived;  and  that  no  one  not 
duly  consecrated  or  ordained,  was  admitted  to  sacred 
offices. 

"Even  in  later  and  more  civilized  times,  the  proba- 
bility of  an  irregularity,  though  very  greatly  dimin- 
ished, is  yet  diminished  only,  and  not  absolutely  des- 
troyed. Even  in  the  memory  of  persons  living, 
there  existed  a  Bishop  concerning  whom  there  was 
so  much  mystery  and  uncertainty  prevailing  as  to 
when,  where,  and  by  whom,  he  had  been  ordained, 
that  doubts  existed  in  the  minds  of  many  persons 
whether  he  had  ever  been  ordained  at  all.  I  do  not 
say  that  there  was  good  ground  for  the  suspicion ;  but 
I  speak  of  the  fact  that  it  did  prevail;  and  that  the 
circumstances  of  the  case  were  such  as  to  make  mani- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  125 

fest  the  2^ossibility  oi  such  an  irregularity  occurring 
under  such  circumstances. 

"  Now,  let  any  one  proceed  on  the  hypothesis  that 
there  are,  suppose,  but  a  hundred  links  connecting 
any  particular  minister  with  the  Apostles;  and  let 
him  even  suppose  that  not  above  half  of  this  number 
pass  through  such  periods  as  admit  of  any  possible 
irregularity;  and  then,  placing  at  the  lowest  estimate 
the  probability  of  defectiveness  in  respect  of  each  of 
the  remaining  fifty,  taken  separately,  let  him  consider 
what  amount  of  probability  will  result  from  the  mul- 
tiplying  of  the  whole  togethe'r.^  The  ultimate  con- 
sequence must  be,  that  any  one  who  sincerely  be- 
lieves that  his  claim  to  the  benefits  of  the  Gospel 
Covenant  depends  on  his  own  minister's  claim  to  the 
supposed  sacramental  virtue  of  true  ordination,  and 
this  again,  on  perfect  Apostolical  Succession  as  above 
described,  must  be  involved,  in  proportion  as  he  reads, 
and  inquires,  and  reflects,  and  reasons,  on  the  sub- 
ject, in  the  most  distressing  doubt  and  perplexity. 

"  It  is  no  wonder,  therefore,  that  the  advocates  of 
this  theory  studiously  disparage  reasoning,  deprecate 

'  Supposing  it  to  be  one  hundred  to  one,  in  each  separate  case, 

in  favour  of  the  legitimacy  and  regularity  of  the  transmission,  and 

the  links  to  amount  to  fifty,  (or  any  other  number)  the  probability  of 

the  unbroken  continuity  of  the  whole  chain   must  be  computed  as 

_9_9_  of  _9_9_.  of  _9_9_.  &c.  to  the  end  of  the  whole  fifty.  Of  course, 
10  0  10  0  100'  ,  ■^  * 

if  different  data  are  assumed,  or  a  different  system  is  adopted  of 

computing  the  rate  at  which  the  uncertainty  increases  at  each  step, 
the  ultimate  result  will  be  different  as  to  the  degree  of  uncertainty ; 
but  when  once  it  is  made  apparent  that  a  considerable  and  continu- 
ally increasing  uncertainty  does  exist,  and  that  the  result  must  be, 
in  respect  of  any  individual  case,  a  matter  of  chance^  it  can  be  of 
no  great  consequence  to  ascertain  precisely  what  the  chances  are 
on  either  side/ 

11^ 


126  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

all  exercise  of  the  mind  in  reflection,  decry  appeals  to 
evidence,  and  lament  that  even  the  power  of  reading 
should  be  imparted  to  the  people.  It  is  not  without 
cause  that  they  dread  and  lament  *  an  age  of  too 
much  light,'  and  wish  to  involve  religion  in  «a  so- 
lemn and  awful  gloom.'  It  is  not  without  cause 
that,  having  removed  the  Christian's  confidence  from 
a  rock,  to  base  it  on  sand,  they  forbid  all  prying  curi- 
osity to  examine  their  foundation." ^ 

The  learned  Archbishop  is  not  alone  in  these 
views.  Chillingworth,  in  his  great  work  entitled 
"The  Religion  of  Protestants  a  safe  way  to  Salva- 
tion," has  occasion  to  controvert  this  dogma  of  an 
unbroken  apostolical  succession,  and  thus  sums  up 
his  argument.  "  In  fine,  to  know  this  one  thing, 
(viz.  that  such  or  such  a  man  is  a  priest,)  you  must 
first  know  ten  thousand  others,  whereof  not  any  one 
is  a  thing  that  can  be  known,  there  being  no  necessity 
that  it  should  be  true,  which  only  can  qualify  any 
thing  for  an  object  of  science;  but  only,  at  the  best, 
a  high  degree  of  probability  that  it  is  so.  But  then, 
that  often  thousand  probables  no  one  should  be  false; 
that  of  ten  thousand  requisites  whereof  any  one  may 
fail,  not  one  should  be  wanting,  this  to  me  is  ex- 
tremely improbable,  nay,  even  cousin-german  to  im- 
possible. So  that  the  assurance  hereof  is  like  a  ma- 
chine composed  of  an  innumerable  multitude  of 
pieces,  of  which  it  is  strangely  unlike  but  some  will 
be  out  of  order ;  and  yet,  if  any  one  be  so,  the  whole 
fabric  of  necessity  falls  to  the  ground.  And  he  that 
shall  put  them  together,  and  maturely  consider  all 
the  possible  ways  of  lapsing  and  nullifying  a  priest- 
hood in  the  Church  of  Rome,  I  believe,  will  be  very 

1  Essays  on  the  Kingdom  of  Chritit,  pp.  183—6. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    STJCCl:SSION.  127 

inclinable  to  think,  that  it  is  an  hundred  to  one,  that 
amongst  an  hundred  seeming  priests,  there  is  not  one 
true  one/^i 

It  is  common  for  Romanists  and  High-Churchmen 
to  say,  that  Chillingworth  presents,  in  this  passage,  a 
very  exaggerated  view  of  the  difficulties  of  their  case. 
But  allowing  that  the  "chances"  are  less  than  a 
"hundred  to  one"  against  the  validity  of  the  claim  of 
any  particular  minister  to  the  true  succession,  still 
there  must  be  in  eve7'y  case  some  measure  of  uncer- 
tainty, and  this  being  settled,  "it  can  be,"  as  Dr. 
Whateley -has  observed,  "of  no  great  consequence  to 
ascertain  precisely  what  the  chances  are  on  either 
side."  Chillingworth's  conclusion,  however,  is  not  to 
be  invahdated  by  any  appeal  to  the  caution  and  regu- 
larity which  now  usually  mark  the  induction  of  men 
into  holy  orders.  It  is  to  be  remembered  that  eighteen 
centuries  have  elapsed  since  the  days  of  the  Apostles; 
that  the  Church  has  passed  through  protracted  sea- 
sons of  disorder,  of  persecution  and  of  declension; 
and  that  the  countries  in  which  Christianity  has  chiefly 
prevailed,  have  been  repeatedly  and  for  long  periods 
together,  filled  with  all  the  confusion  and  turmoil  in- 
separable from  wars  and  revolutions.  Is  there  the 
slightest  probability  that,  under  these  circumstances, 
all  the  canonical  requisitions  have  been  duly  attended 
to  in  every  instance  of  prelatical  consecration?  Take, 
for  example,  these  general  statistics  in  reference  to 
the  Church  of  Rome.  (It  will  be  shown,  hereafter, 
that  the  Episcopal  Church  in  Great  Britain  and 
America,  derives  its  succession  from  the  Church  of 
Rome.)     From  a.  d.  604  to  806,  there  were  thirty- 

iPartl.  Ch.  2.Sec.  67. 


128  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

five  Popes,  whose  average  life  did  not,  of  course,  ex- 
ceed six  years.  In  the  next  one  hundred  and  fifty- 
three  years,  there  were  no  less  than  fifty-eight  Popes, 
whose  official  life  averaged  from  two  to  three  years ! 
In  the  next  period,  down  to  1512,  there  are  seventy- 
one  Popes — averaging  a  reign  of  six  years  each. — 
Then,  amidst  the  uncertainty  and  confusion  which 
such  figures  indicate,  we  find,  on  turning  to  ecclesias- 
tical history,  that  among  the  Popes,  there  were  fre- 
quent depositions,  restorations,  rivalries  and  schisms — 
that  sometimes  there  were  several  Popes  reigning  at 
one  time,  one  excommunicating  another — and  some- 
times there  was  no  Pope  at  all,  but  vacancies  in  the 
Roman  See.  There  was  a  schism  carried  on  by  four 
anti-Popes  in  the  twelfth  century,  which  lasted  for 
twenty-one  years ;  and  another  in  the  fourteenth  cen- 
tury, which  lasted  for  thirty-one  years;  in  which 
periods,  probably  every  Episcopal  See  in  Europe  was 
filled  by  several  Bishops,  who  received  their  nomina- 
tion or  ordination  from  some  one  or  other  of  the  rival 
Popes; — and  yet  the  Council  of  Constance  deposed 
two  of  them,  and  received  the  resignation  of  a  third, 
before  appointing  Martin  to  the  Pontificate.  What 
becomes  of  the  succession,  and  of  the  validity  of  ordi- 
nances, in  cases  like  these ?^ 

"  In  our  own  Island  (says  Mr.  Macauley,  in  his 
elaborate  article  on  Church  and  State  in  the  Edin- 
burgh Review)  it  was  the  complaint  of  Alfred,  that 
not  a  single  priest  south  of  the  Thames  and  very  few 
on  the  north,  could  read  either  Latin  or  English. 
And  this  illiterate  clergy  exercised  their  ministry 
amidst  a  rude  and  half-heathen  population,  in  which 

'  Vide  MitcheU's  Presbyterian  Letters. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  129 

Danish  pirates,  unchristened,  or  christened  by  the 
hundred  on  the  field  of  battle,  were  mingled  with  a 
Saxon  peasantry  scarcely  better  instructed  in  religion. 
The  state  of  Ireland  was  still  worse.  "  Tota  ilia  per 
imiversam  Hiberniam  dissolutio  ecclesiasticae  discip- 
linae, — ilia  ubique  pro  consuetudine  Christiana  saeva 
subintroducta  barbaries" — are  the  expressions  of  St. 
Bernard.  We  are,  therefore,  at  a  loss  to  conceive 
how  any  clergyman  can  feel  confident  that  his  orders 
have  come  down  correctly.  Whether  he  be  really  a 
successor  of  the  Apostles,  depends  on  an  immense 
number  of  such  contingencies  as  these, — whether  un- 
der King  Ethelwolf,  a  stupid  priest  might  not,  while 
baptizing  several  scores  of  Danish  soldiers  who  had 
just  made  their  option  between  the  font  and  the  gal- 
lows, inadvertently  omit  to  perform  the  rite  on  one  of 
these  graceless  proselytes? — whether,  in  the  seventh 
century,  an  impostor  who  had  never  received  conse- 
cration, might  not  have  passed  himself  off  as  a  Bishop 
on  a  rude  tribe  of  Scots?  —  whether  a  lad  of  twelve 
did  really,  by  a  ceremony  huddled  over  when  he  was 
too  drunk  to  know  what  he  was  about,  convey  the 
Episcopal  character  to  a  lad  often?" 

Again,  he  says,  "  Let  us  suppose — and  we  are  sure 
that  no  person  will  think  the  supposition  by  any 
means  improbable — that  in  the  third  century,  a  man 
of  no  principle  and  some  parts,  who  has,  in  the  course 
of  a  roving  and  discreditable  life,  been  a  catechumen 
at  Antioch,and  has  there  become  familiar  with  Chris- 
tian usages  and  doctrines,  afterwards  rambles  to  Mar- 
seilles where  he  finds  a  Christian  society,  rich,  liberal, 
and  simple-hearted.  He  pretends  to  be  a  Christian, 
attracts  notice  by  his  abilities  and  affected  zeal,  and 
is  raised  to  the  Episcopal  dignity  without  ever  hav- 


130  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

ing  been  baptized.  That  such  an  event  might  hap- 
pen, nay,  was  very  hkely  to  happen,  cannot  well  be 
disputed  by  any  one  who  has  read  the  Life  of  Pere- 
grinus.  ....  Now,  this  unbaptized  impostor  is  evi- 
dently no  successor  of  the  Apostles.  He  is  not  even 
a  Christian;  and  all  orders  derived  through  such  a 
pretended  bishop,  are  altogether  invalid.  Do  we 
know  enough  of  the  state  of  the  world,  and  of  the 
Church  in  the  third  century,  to  be  able  to  say  with 
confidence  that  there  were  not  at  that  time  twenty 
such  pretended  bishops  ?  Every  such  case  makes  a 
break  in  the  Apostolical  Succession.'^ ^ 

The  intimation  here  thrown  out,  that  the  case  of 
Peregrinus  was  by  no  means  peculiar  even  in  the 
early  church,  is  confirmed  by  numerous  well-attested 
facts.  Eusebius  states  that  the  famous  Novatian  ob- 
tained consecration  as  a  bishop  by  inveigling  three 
bishops,  "  ignorant  and  simple  men,"  into  bad  com- 
pany, where,  after  they  had  become  "heated  with 
wine  and  surfeiting,"  he  induced  them  to  lay  hands 
upon  him. 2  In  the  history  of  the  proceedings  of  the 
Council  of  Nice  mention  is  made  of  one  Melitius  who, 
after  being  deposed  by  his  superior,  went  about  con- 
ferring ordination,  and  whose  ordinations  the  council 
agreed  to  admit,  on  condition  that  those  by  whom 
they  had  been  received,  should  occupy  a  sort  of 
second  place  to  those  who  had  been  catholically  or- 
dained. ^  In  the  fourth  century  we  find  Jerome  la- 
menting the  profligacy,  the  avarice,  and  general  cor- 
ruption of  the  clergy  of  all  ranks.     Gregory  of  Nan- 

1  Miscellanies,  vol.  iii.  pp.  299-301. 

2  Hist.  Eccl.  Lib.  vi.  43. 

3  Socratis  H.  E.  Lib.  i.  9.     Sozomeni  H.  E.  Lib,  i.  24.— Cited,  with 
most  of  the  following  examples  by  Mr.  Alexander. 


THE    Al'OSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  131 

zianzum  complains  bitterly  and  frequently  of  the 
same  thing;  telling  us  in  one  place,  that  "bishoprics 
were  oblained  not  by  virtue,  but  by  craft,  and  were 
the  perquisite  not  of  the  worthiest  but  of  the  strong- 
est;" in  another  place  denouncing  some  who  could 
be  "  Simon  Magus  to-morrow,  though  to-day  Simon 
Peter;"  and  in  another,  informing  us  of  one  who, 
though  uni)aptize<l  and  unconverted,  was  forced  by 
the  joopulace  to  assume  the  office  of  bishop,  i  This 
happened  also  in  the  case  of  Ambrose,  bishop  of 
Milan,  who  describes  himself  as  not  nursed  in  the 
bosom  of  the  Church,  but  snatched  from  the  courts  of 
law  and  compelled  to  be  a  Bishop.  The  case  of 
Synesius,  Bishop  of  Cyrene  was  analagous :  he  tells 
us  that  he  would  rather  have  died  a  thousand  deaths 
than  become  a  bishop,  laments  the  loss  of  his  hunting 
establishment  and  pursuits,  acknowledges  himself  a 
skejjtic  on  some  points  of  the  Christian  religion,  and 
claims  the  privilege  of  deceiving  the  people,  on  the 
ground  that  as  darkness  is  good  for  those  afflicted 
with  ophthalmia,  so  a  falsehood  is  advantageous  to 
the  mob,  whilst  truth  may  be  noxious. ^  These  testi- 
monies relate,  it  will  be  observed,  to  the  first  four 
centuries,  that  golden  age  in  the  Puseyite  calendar, 
whose  Christianity  is  the  model  to  which  they  are 
labouring  so  assiduously  to  bring  back  the  Church. 

There  is  ample  evidence  that  these  gross  irregular- 
ities, so  disastrous  to  the  theory  of  an  unbroken  pre- 
latical  succession,  increased  in  number  and  enormity 
through  the  dark  ages.  But  before  citing  further 
examples  it  may  be  proper  to  show  from  what  source 

1  Orat.  43,  in  laudem  Basil.    Carm.  de  se  ipso  ver.  430.  Orat.  19. 

2  Ep.  63,  11,  105. 


132  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

the  British  aiid  American  Prelates  of  the  present 
day  derive  their  succession. 

The  favourite  theory  of  High-Churchmen,  is,  that 
the  British  Church  was  planted  by  Apostohc  hands — 
that  it  was  duly  organized  under  Bishops,  Priests, 
and  Deacons,  long  .before  the  Church  of  Rome  at- 
tempted to  extend  her  jurisdiction  to  Britain — that 
Romanism  was  subsequently  superinduced  upon  the 
ancient  Church,  and  uncanonically  controlled  it  for 
several  centuries ;  and  that  the  Reformation  was 
nothing  more  than  the  old  British  Church  throwing 
ofT  the  Papal  yoke,  and  resuming,  the  plenary  posses- 
sion and  exercise  of  those  powers  and  functions  which 
had  by  compulsion  been  held  for  a  time  in  abeyance. 
It  is  one  thing  to  frame  a  theory,  and  quite  another  to 
prove  it.  This  theory  fails  hi  a  point  of  as  much 
moment  to  a  theory  as  an  edifice,  viz.  the  founda- 
tion. The  best  historians  of  the  Church  of  England 
speak  of  the  Apostles  having  introduced  Christianity 
into  Britain  as  a  mere  supposition  or  possibility. 
Such  is  the  view  of  all,  it  is  believed,  of  the  late  his- 
torians— certainly  of  Bishop  Short,  Churton,  Blunt, 
and  Burton.  "  We  need  not,"  says  the  last  of  these 
writers,  "believe  the  traditions  concerning  its  first 
conversion ;  and  it  is  right  to  add  that  the  earliest 
writer  who  speaks  of  Britain  as  having  been  visited 
by  any  of  the  Apostles  is  Eusebius  who  wrote  at  the 
beginning  of  the  fourth  century;  and  the  earliest 
writer  who  names  St.  Paul,  is  Theodoret,  who  lived 
a  century  laier.^"*  This  surely  is  enough  to  abate 
the  confidence  of  those  over-zealous  Prelatists  who 
allow  themselves  to  assert  so  positively  that  Paul 
was  the  founder  of  the  British  Church.  And,  then, 
as  to  the  Prelacy  of  this  Church,  that  is  a  point  to  be 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  133 

proved,  not  assumed.  Certainly,  the  circumstance 
that  there  were  Bishops  from  Britain  at  the  Councils 
of  Aries  and  Sardica,  in  the  fourth  century,  can  be 
allowed  no  weight  as  an  argument  on  this  point, 
unless  it  can  be  proved  that  these  were  Diocesan,  not 
scriptural  or  Presbyter-bishops.  But  if  this  point 
were  conceded,  it  would  avail  nothing  to  the  advo- 
cates of  an  unbroken  succession.  For  Stilhngfleet,  in 
his  work  on  British  Antiquities,  candidly  says,  "  By 
the  loss  of  records  of  the  British  Churches,  ive  cannot 
draw  down  the  succession  of  Bishops  from  the  Jlpos- 
tles^  times.  We  cannot  deduce  a  lineal  succession 
of  Bishops,  as  they  could  in  other  Churches  whose 
writings  were  preserved."  Here,  then,  is  a  chasm 
which  no  ingenuity  or  sagacity  can  bridge  over.  In 
just  so  far  as  the  orders  of  English  or  American  clergy- 
men depend  upon  a  succession  derived  through  the 
early  British  Church,  they  are,  on  the  showing  of 
their  own  ablest  historians,  worthless.  If  they  have 
the  succession  at  all,  it  must  be  from  Rome.  The 
Roman  succession  was  introduced  into  England  under 
circumstances  which  require  a  passing  notice. 

The  first  Papal  missionary  to  Britain,  was  the 
monk  Augustine,^  who  passed  over  a.  d.  596.  He 
was  clothed  by  Gregory,  the  Bishop  of  Rome,  with 
''  full  jurisdiction  over  the  British  Bishops.''  But 
this  was  a  power  which  Gregory  had  no  authority  to 
confer.  Allowing,  what  High-Churchmen  claim,  that 
there  were  Diocesan  Bishops  in  England  at  this  time, 
(although  most  of  them  had  been  driveti  by  the  com- 
motions of  the  times,  temporarily  from  their  sees,) 
they  owed   no   allegiance   to  the  Bishop  of  Rome. 

'  Not  the  celebrated  Father  of  that  name. 
12 


134  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

Gregory  had  no  canonical  authority  whatever  within 
the  realm  of  England.  It  is  clearly  settled  by  the 
canons  that  a  Bishop  has  no  power  beyond  his  own 
diocese,  and  specially  that  he  can  exercise  no  function 
that  pertains  to  the  diocese  of  another  Bishop.^  His 
attempt  to  make  Augustine  Primate  of  England,  was, 
therefore,  uncanonical  and  schisviatical ;  and,  as 
such,  it  was  resisted  by  the  British  Bishops  and 
monks. 2  On  the  principles  of  those  who  suspend  the 
being  of  the  church  on  an  unbroken,  regular  succes- 
sion, Augustine  had  and  could  have  no  legitimate 
ecclesiastical  authority  in  Britain,  and  all  the  orders 
he  pretended  to  confer,  with  those,  of  course,  of  the 
present  British  and  American  Prelates,  in  so  far  as 
they  are  derived  from  him,  must  be  invalid.  On  this 
point  I  may  be  allowed  to  quote  an  authority  that  is 
quite  apposite.  "What  business,'^  says  Bishop  Doane 
of  New  Jersey,  in  his  review  of  Bishop  Kenrick's^ 
Letter  to  the  Bishops  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal 
Church,  "  what  business  has  the  '  Bishop  of  Arath'  in 
the  city  of  Philadelphia  ?  Is  it  not  against  all  Catholic 
rule  that  two  Bishops  should  exercise  their  functions 
in  one  city,  unless  one  be  assistant  to  the  other?  Was 
there  not  a  Bishop  having  jurisdiction  in  Philadelphia, 
in  1808,  when  the  "Diocese  of  Philadelphia,"  so 
called,  was  created  ?  Was  not  the  second  Bishop, 
called  by  whatever  name,  in  partibus  infidelium, 
an  intruder  there?  Does  not  the  Bishop  of  Arath, 
claiming  jurisdiction,  or  exercising  functions  in  the 
diocese  of  Pennsylvania,  convict  himself  before  the 
world,  and  in  the  sight  of  God,  of  schism,  and  worse  V 

«   Vide  Canon.  Apost.  27,  28,     Nicene  16.    Sardican  15. 

2  So  says  Fuller,  as  cited  by  Bishop  McCoskry. 

3  The  Romish  Bishop. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  135 

He  fortifies  this  doctrine  by  various  decrees  of  coun- 
cils, among  which  he  quotes  a  canon  of  the  Council 
of  Chalcedon  in  these  words: — "Let  not  a  Bishop  go 
into  another  city  or  district  not  pertaining  to  him, 
to  ordain  any  one,  or  to  appoint  any  Presbyters  or 
Deacons  to  places  subject  to  another  Bishop,  unless 
with  the  consent  of  the  proper  Bishop  of  the  district. 
If  any  one  dare  (the  capitals  and  italics  are  Bishop 
Doane's)  to  do  otherwise^  let  the  ordination  he  in- 
valid, and  himself  be  punished  by  the  Synod.^^^ 

This,  however  is  not  the  only  taint  which  attaches 
to  the  proceedings  of  Augustine.  We  have  no  cer- 
tain record  of  his  own  consecration  as  a  Bishop. 
Bede  says  he  was  consecrated  by  Etherius  of  Aries. 
Richardson  affirms,  on  the  authority  of  registers  still 
extant,  that  he  was  consecrated  by  Eucherius  oi 
Aries.  But  Du  Pin  shows  that  there  was  no  such 
Bishop  as  Etherius  or  Eucherius  then  at  Aries.  There 
was  an  Etherius  at  that  time  at  Lyons,  but  the  co- 
temporary  prelate  at  Aries  was  Virgilius.     Du  Pin. 

1  Eisliop  Doane's  Brief  Exam.  pp.  190-2.  This  writer  seems  to 
have  felt  that  the  weapon  he  was  flourishing  at  the  Romanists,  might 
be  turned  against  himself.  He  knew  that  in  some  of  the  States, 
Romanism  was  older  than  Episcopacy;  and  that  the  question  might 
be  asked,  "  Was  there  not  a  Bishop  in  Maryland  when  the  first  Pro- 
testant Episcopal  Bishop  was  appointed  to  that  diocese ;  and  if  so, 
was  not  this  second  Bishop  *  an  intruder^  there  ?"  To  ward  off  this 
question  apparently,  he  observes  in  a  note  that  the  Romish  Church 
is  in  a  schismatical  position  in  this  country,  because  "  the  United 
States"  were  formerly  [i.  e.  at  the  period  when  the  first  Papal  Bishop 
was  sent  here]  "in  communion  with  the  Church  of  England,  as 
British  Provinces."  How  this  could  be  when  there  were  neither 
Episcopal  dioceses  nor  Bishops  here  before  the  Revolution,  we  are 
not  told.  But  how  is  the  case  of  Louisiana  to  be  got  over  ?  That 
was  not  a  "  British  Province"  "  in  communion  with  the  Church  of 
England."  If  the  Episcopal  Church  ventures  to  send  a  Bishop  to 
that  State,  who  will  be  guilty  of'*  schismatical  intrusion'''  then? 


136  THE    IIIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

inclines  to  the  opinion  tliat  he  was  consecrated  by  the 
former;  but  Pope  Gregor}^,  in  a  letter  still  extant, 
says  he  was  consecrated  in  Germany.  The  point  is 
so  dark  and  the  authorities  so  conflicting,  that  while 
Du  Pin  proves  that  Bede  was  mistaken,  Baronius 
would  show  that  Gregory  also  was  at  fault.  V  Here, 
then,  are  four  historians  vouching  each  a  difl:erent 
statement  from  the  rest  in  relation  to  this  man's  con- 
secration. That  three  out  of  the  four  are  in  error,  is 
certain;  that  the  four  are  in  error  is  not  improbable. 
Which  of  them  are  wrong?  Who  of  them  is  right? 
Are  they  all  wrong?  These  are  questions  that  can- 
not be  answered  with  any  degree  of  confidence,  ex- 
cept by  that  sort  of  persons  who  are  equally  confi- 
dent with  and  without  evidence.  And  yet  the  valid- 
ity of  the  orders  of  the  English  and  American  Epis- 
copal clergy  of  the  present  day,  may  in  a  consider- 
able degree  depend  upon  the  canonical  consecration 
of  this  monk,  who  lived  among  a  semi-barbarous  peo- 
ple twelve  hundred  years  ago,  and  concerning  the  time, 
place,  and  instruments  of  whose  consecration,  the 
ablest  historians  are  irreconcileably  at  variance  with 
each  other!  Such  is  this  beautiful  theory  of  the 
Apostolical  Succession  on  which,  we  are  told,  is  hung 
the  world's  salvation. 

We  have  not  yet  done  with  Augustine.  Supposing 
the  difficulties  connected  with  his  own  mission  and 
consecration  to  be  surmounted,  there  is  a  fatal  defect 
in  the  orders  conferred  by  him.  It  is  a  well  estab- 
lished principle  that  a  Bishop  cannot  under  any  cir- 
cumstances be  consecrated  by  a  single  Prelate.  The 
canons  require  at  least  three  Bishops  as  essential  to 
a  regular  consecration.     ''  The  council  of  Nice,"  says 

1  Vide  Presbyterian  Review,  Vol.  xiv.  p.  4. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.'  137 

Bishop  Doane  in  reply  to  Bishop  Kenrick,  (p.  228) 
"decrees  (Canon  IV.),  ^It  is  most  fitting  that  a  Bish- 
op be  appointed  by  all  the  Bishops  in  the  province. 
But  if  this  be  difficult  by  reason  of  any  urgent  neces- 
sity, or  through  the  length  of  the  way,  three  must  hy 
all  means  meet  together.'  It  was  decreed  by  the 
Synods  of  Aries,  Nice,  Antioch,  Laodicea,  Carthage, 
Orange,  that  at  least  three  Bishops  should  consecrate. 
Now  Dr.  John  Carroll,  the  first  titular  Bishop  of  Bal- 
timore, was  consecrated  by  Dr.  Walmsley  alone;  and 
it  is  believed,  with  good  reason,  that  Dr.  Walmsley 
himself  was  consecrated  by  but  one  Bishop.  '  Now 
an  ordination,'  says  one  of  their  chief  writers, '  which 
is  merely  probable,  or  only  probably  sufficient  and 
valid,  only  makes  a  probable  Bishop,  or  one  who  is 
merely  probably  a  Bishop.  *  *  *  B^t  he  who  is 
only  probably  a  Bishop  is  not  validly  and  sufficiently 
appointed  to  the  Episcopal  degree  and  power;  nor 
has  he  Episcopal  vocation;  for  true  and  valid  Episco- 
pal vocation  is  not  merely  probable,  but  certain  and 
undoubted.  *  *  *  But  otherwise,  whatever  the 
Pastors  and  Bishops  of  the  Church  should  perform, 
as  Bishops,  would  be  so  uncertain  as  to  be  probably 
null  and  invalid.'  "^ 

Mr.  Palmer,  to  whom  Bishop  Doane  is  evidently 
indebted  for  these  facts  and  authorities,  concludes  his 
examination  of  the  subject  with  this  remark : — "  Con- 
necting these  circumstances  with  the  universal  preva- 
lence of  the  rule  afterwards,  which  required  Bishops 
always  to  be  ordained  by  more  than  one  Bishop,  it 
does  seem  probable,  that  Episcopal  ordinations,  which 
are  only  performed  hy  one  Bishop,  are  not  valid.'''' "^ 

•  Bishop  Doane's  Brief  Ex.  p.  228. 
2  Palmer  on  the  Church,  Vol.  II.  402. 
12* 


138  THE    HIGH-CHURCII    DOCTRINE    OF 

Now  it  is  a  fact  established  on  the  testimony  •of 
"venerable  Bede/'^  himself  a  warmpartizan  of  Rome, 
and  not  disputed  by  any  competent  authority  what- 
ever, that  when  Augustine  came  to  England,  as  he 
was  disowned  by  the  native  Bishops,  and  was  him- 
self the  only  Romish  Prelate  in  the  Island,  he  quiet- 
ly laid  the  canons  on  the  shelf,  and  not  only  ordained 
Presbyters,  but  actually  consecrated  Prelates,  or  pre- 
tended to  do  so,  singly  and  alone.  Gregory  him- 
self permitted  this  course  of  procedure,  on  condition 
that  he  should  in  due  season  return  to  canonical  order, 
— "just  as  if  a  return  to  canonical  obedience  could  pos- 
sibly homologate  previous  uncanonical  proceedings."^ 
On  this  ground,  then,  as  well  as  those  already  men- 
tioned, the  consecrations  performed  by  Augustine 
were  invalid,  or,  according  to  the  authority  quoted  by 
Bishop  Doane,  ^'probably  null  and  invalid."  The  Bish- 
ops he  ordained  by  himself  w^ere  at  best  only  ''■  proba- 
ble Bishops :"  and  by  necessary  consequence,  all  the 
orders  derived  from  them — ^including,  it  may  be,  those 
of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Bishop  in  New  Jersey 
and  many  of  his  brethren — labour  under  the  same 
defect : — so  that  there  may  perchance  be  more  ^'pro- 
bable Bishops"  in  ihe  United  States  than  those  in  the 
Romish  Church. 

It  has  been  already  shown  that  the  succession  is 
cut  oiT  from  the  "early  British  Church."  Prelatists 
have  attempted  to  coimect  themselves  with  the  Apos- 
tles by  another  line,  through  the  ancient  Culdees  of 
Scotland  and  Ireland.  A  few  words  on  this  point 
may  not  be  amiss  at  this  stage  of  our  inquiry. 

There  is  some  ground  to  believe  that  Christianity 

1  Vide  Bedc's  Eccl.  Hist.  B.  I.  27. 

2  Presbyterian  Review,  ut  sup. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  139 

was  introdaced  into  Scotland  as  early  as  the  second 
century;  and  it  is  known  to  have  been  generally  pro- 
fessed there  in  a.  d.  431.  The  Culdees  appeared  in 
Ireland  at  a  very  early  period,  and  are  found  there 
in  an  organized  society  in  546.  Columba,  their  sup- 
posed founder,  with  twelve  associates,  passed  over 
to  the  island  of  I.  or  Zona,  in  563,  and  established 
the  Culdean  monastery,  which  afterwards  became 
so  celebrated  in  the  ecclesiastical  history  of  Britain. 
The  labours  of  Augustine,  the  Romish  missionary 
and  bishop,  were,  it  should  be  noted,  restricted  to  a 
comparatively  small  part  of  Britain.  When  he  arrived 
there  in  596,  the  country  was  overrun  by  the  heathen 
Saxon  invaders,  who  had  obliterated  most  of  the 
public  insignia  and  rites  of  Christianity,  and  destroyed 
or  driven  away  the  ministers  of  the  gospel,  and  such 
of  the  Britons  as  adhered  to  them.  Several  of  their 
bishops  had  fled  to  Wales,  and  thither  Augustine  fol- 
lowed them.  Archdeacon  Mason  has  shown  that  he 
was  "  the  apostle  not  of  the  Briton^,  nor  of  the  Scots, 
nor  of  all  the  Jutes,  (that  is,  the  Saxons  who  came 
from  Scotland,)  but  of  the  county  of  Kent  alone." 
Usher  has  proved  that  nearly  the  whole  of  Saxon 
England  was  converted  by  the  Scottish  missionaries, 
Aidan,  Finan,  Colman,  and  their  associates,  who  were 
sent  out  from  the  Culdee  monastery  or  college,  at 
lona,  and  other  similar  colleges  subsequently  founded. 
Dr.  Jamieson,  in  his  elaborate  "  Historical  Account 
of  the  Ancient  Culdees,"  observes,  that  "  how  little 
soever  some  now  think  of  Scottish  orders,  it  is  evident 
from  the  testimony  of  the  most  ancient  and  most 
respectable  historian  of  South  Britain,  that  by  means 
of  Scottish  missionaries,  or  those  whom  they  had  in- 
structed or  ordained,  not  only  the  Northumbrians,  but 


140  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

the  Miclde  Angles,  the  Mercians  and  East  Saxons,  all 
the  way  to  the  river  Thames,  that  is,  the  inhabitants 
of  by  far  the  greatest  part  of  the  country  now  called 
England,  were  converted  to  Christianity.  It  is  equally 
evident,  that  for  some  time  they  acknowledged  sub- 
jection to  the  ecclesiastical  government  of  the  Scots; 
and  that  the  only  reason  why  they  lost  their  influence, 
was,  that  their  missionaries  chose  rather  to  give  up 
their  charges,  than  to  submit  to  the  prevailing  influ- 
ence of  the  Church  of  Rome,  to  which  the  Saxons  of 
the  west  and  of  Kent  had  subjected  themselves."  In 
the  end,  all  the  Culdee  missionaries  retired  from  Eng- 
land, and  the  churches  established  by  them  m  that 
country  became  tributary  to  the  see  of  Rome. 

That  the  Culdees  were  Presbyterians^ndi  not  P^e- 
latists.  Dr.  Jamieson  and  others  have  proved  by  what 
may  be  regarded  as  a  redundance  of  facts  and  testi- 
monies— a  summary  of  which  may  be  seen  in  Dr. 
Smyth's  able  work  on  "  Presbytery  and  Prelacy,"  and 
in  Dr.  Brown's  "Letters  on  Puseyite  Episcopacy." 
That  there  were  "  Bishops"  among  them,  and  that 
some  of  their  principal  missionaries  to  England  were 
Bishops,  is  admitted  on  all  hands.  But  when  the 
rank  of  these  Bishops  comes  to  be  investigated,  they 
are  found  to  be  of  the  same  order  as  Presbyters,  and 
to  have  received  only  presbyterial  ordination.  Bedc 
testifies  that  the  head  of  the  whole  body  was  "  a  monk 
and  a  Presbyter,  but  7io  Bishop?^  The  assembly  of 
Presbyters,  with  this  presbyter-president  or  modera- 
tor, "  made  the  Bishops.''^  Thus,  speaking  of  Aidan, 
Bede  says,  "  Thus  making  Mm  Bishop,  they  sent 
him  forth  to  preach."  Fordoun  states  also,  that 
Columba,  the  head  of  the  monastery,  though  only  a 
Presbyter,  as  we  have  seen,  "  confirmed  and  conse- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  141 

crated  all  the  Irish  Bishops  of  his  time."  Of  course, 
as  the  ordainers  in  all  these  cases  were  only  Presby- 
ters, though  styled  Bishops,  they  could  confer  no 
higher  order  than  they  possessed,  and  all  who  ^vere 
ordained  by  them  must  have  been,  as  to  order,  Pres- 
byters simply. 

If,  then,  Prelatists  insist  upon  an  apostolical  descent 
through  the  Culdees,  it  is  certain  they  hcive  only  pres- 
byterial  orders,  and  their  succession  amounts  to  no- 
thing more  than  is  possessed  by  the  rest  of  Protestant 
Christendom.  This  line,  however,  Avas,  as  already 
stated,  after  awhile  merged  in  the  Roman  succession. 
So  that  even  if  it  could  be  proved  that  Diocesan  Epis- 
copacy prevailed  among  the  Culdees,  it  would  avail 
nothing  to  the  cause  of  Prelacy,  which  is  shut  up  to 
the  Roman  succession  alone.  But  if  Prelatists  can 
derive  no  aid  from  the  Culdees,  we  can  employ  them 
to  good  purpose  in  contesting  the  dogma  of  an  unbro- 
ken prelaticctl  succession.  The  Culdees  were,  as  we 
have  seen,  Presbyterians;  that  is,  their  ministers,  and 
those  ordained  by  them,  though  called  Bishops,  were 
only  of  the  order  of  Presbyters.  Now,  during  their 
long-continued  and  prosperous  missions  in  England, 
they  founded  churches  and  ordained  ministers  for  "the 
greater  part  of  that  country."  These  ministers,  or 
their  lineal  descendants,  were  afterwards  compelled  or 
induced  to  conform  to  the  Church  of  Rome.  There  is 
no  evidence  lohatever  that  in  doing  this  they  were  re- 
ordained.  Indeed  it  does  not  appear  that  their  orders 
had,  at  this  period,  ever  been  called  in  question;  and 
they  would  have  been  received  and  incorporated  into 
the  Roman  Church  many  years  sooner,  if  they  would 
have  owned  the  supremacy  of  Rome,  and  acknow- 
ledged the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury  as  their  metro- 


142  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

politan. — Here  we  have  an  instance  of  a  large  infu- 
sion of  Presbyterian  orders  into  the  only  channel 
of  succession  through  which  the  mysterious  *' Episco- 
pal grace"  has  come  down  to  the  Bishops  of  our 
day.  "The  Bishops,"  says  Dr.  Calamy,  "  who  were  so 
instrumental  in  converting  the  northern  parts  of  this 
island  to  Christianity,  were  ordained  by  the  Abbot 
of  Hye  (lona)  without  the  concurrence  of  any  one 
proper  ecclesiastical  Bishop."  These  orders  were  soon 
merged  in  the  Romish  Church,  and  must  have  diffused 
the  strong  Presbyterial  taint  that  attached  to  them 
through  the  English  succession.  If,  then,  a  stream 
cannot  rise  higher  than  its  fountain,  what  becomes  of 
the  uninterrupted  Prelatical  succession  of  the  Church 
of  England? 

Our  inquiry  into  the  early  Christianity  of  the  Bri- 
tish Isles,  has  brought  us  to  these  conclusions,  to  wit: 
That  Christianity  was  introduced  into  England,  Scot- 
land, and  Ireland,  as  early  as  the  second  century,  but 
by  whom  is  unknown:  that  the  succession  of  Bishops 
in  the  "early  British  Church,"  cannot  be  traced:  that 
the  mission  of  Augustine  from  Rome  to  Britain  was 
uncanonical  and  schismatical — that  there  is  no  authen- 
tic account  of  his  own  consecration  as  a  Bishop — that 
many  of  the  consecrations  performed  by  him  were 
"  probably"  null  and  void,  and,  consequently,  that 
the  same  defect  attaches  to  all  the  orders  derived 
from  the  Bishops  thus  illegally  consecrated — that  the 
Culdees  of  Scotland  and  Ireland  were  Presbyterians, 
and  that  there  is  a  very  large  infusion  of  orders 
derived  from  them,  in  the  Roman  succession — and, 
finally,  that  as  the  English  and  American  Prelates 
derive  their  orders  from  Rome,  and  partly,  at  least, 
through  the  specific  channels  that  have  been  mention- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  143 

ed,  they  neither  have  nor  can  have  any  adequate 
evidence  that  they  are  in  the  true  hue  of  succession 
from  the  Apostles,  or,  indeed,  tliat  there  is  any  such 
succession  as  they  contend  for. 

It  was  shown,  before  entering  upon  this  inquiry 
into  the  origin  of  Enghsh  and  American  orders,  that 
the  succession  could  not  be  traced  from  the  Apostles 
to  the  fourth  century;  and  various  statements  were 
given,  on  the  authority  of  eminent  writers,  respecting 
the  gross  irregularities  that  frequently  prevailed  in 
the  consecration  of  Bishops  from  that  period  down  to 
the  Reformation,  and  even  to  a  still  later  date.  Both 
classes  of  these  testimonies  bear  directly  upon  the 
question  of  succession  in  the  Church  of  England,  and 
its  daughter  in  this  country.  The  latter  of  them  I 
shall  now  augment  by  citing  a  few  additional  facts  in 
relation  to  the  Roman  succession. 

I  begin  by  showing  that  a  large  number  of  the 
Archbishops  of  Canterbury,  have  been  consecrated 
directly  by  the  Popes  or  their  Legates.  The  following 
table  has  been  compiled  by  Mr.  Powell,  from  Bishop 
Godwin's  ''Lives  of  the  English  Bishops." 

Years  of 
A.  D.       J^Tames.  Where  and  hij  whom  ordained.  Episc. 

668.  Theodore,  Rome,  Pope  Vitalian,  22 

735.  Nortlielm,  Rome,  Pope  Gregory  III.  5 

763.  Lambert,  Rome,  Pope  Paul  I.  27 

891.  Plegmund,  Rome,  Pope  Formosus,  26 

1020.  Agelnoth,  Rome,  17 

1138.  Theobald,  Lend.  Card.  Albert,  Pope's  Legate,    22 

1174.  Richard,  Anagni,  Pope  Alexander  III.  9 

1207.  Steplien  Langton,  Viterbo,  Pope  Innocent  III.  22 

1245.  Boniface,  Lyons,  Pope  Innocent  IV.  26 

1278.  John  Peckham,  Pope  Nicholas  III.  13 

1294.  Robert  Winchelsey,  Rome,  Cardinal  Sabinus,  19 

1313.  Walter  Raynold,  Robert  Winchelsey,  13 


144  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 


Years  of 

A.D. 

J^amcs. 

Where  and  by  whom  ordained. 

Episc. 

1327. 

Simon  Mepham, 

Avignon,  by  order  of  Pope 

John  XXII. 

5 

1333. 

John  Stratford, 

Avignon,  Cardinal  Vitalis, 

15 

1349. 

Thomas  Bradvvardine, 

,  Avignon,  Cardinal  Bertrand. 

1349. 

Simon  Islip, 

R.  Stratford,  Bishop,  Lond.,  who 
was  consecrated  by  Jno.  Strat- 

ford, (see  above,) 

16 

13G6. 

Simon  Langham, 

Simon  Islip,  as  above. 

1414. 

Henr)'  Chichlcy, 

Sienna,  Pope  Gregory  XII. 

29 

The  same  historian  gives  a  list  of  twelve  Arch- 
bishops of  York,  nine  Bishops  of  Durham,  eight 
Bishops  of  Winchester,  &c.,  who  received  ordination 
from  Rome.  It  is  clear  to  demonstration,  then,  that 
the  English  and  American  succession  flows  through 
all  the  pollution  of  Popery.  I  would  gladly  spare 
myself  the  revolting  task  of  laying  open  the  channel 
of  this  pretended  succession;  but  the  arrogant  preten- 
sions of  High-Churchmen  make  this  duty  indispensa- 
ble. They  are  "  the  Church"  because  they  hav^e  this 
succession;  we  are  no  Church  and  are  given  over  to 
"  uncovenanted  mercy,"  because  we  lack  it. — In  look- 
ing at  the  characters  who  make  up  the  chain  of 
"Apostles,"  let  it  be  distinctly  remembered  that  it  is 
an  essential  part  of  the  theory  under  examination, 
that  the  gift  of  the  Holy  Ghost  is  transmitted  alojig 
this  line  from  one  Prelate  to  another,  and  that  in  this 
way  it  has  come  down  from  the  Saviour  and  his 
Apostles  to  the  ministers  and  churches  of  our  day. 

According  to  the  canonical  law  just  adverted  to, 
that  ordination  performed  by  a  single  Bishop  can 
make  at  best  only  "  probable  Bishops,"  a  flaw  very 
soon  occurred  after  Augustine's  time  in  the  succes- 
sion of  Canterbury.     Bede  states  (Book  III.  ch.  20.) 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCEg-SION.  145 

that  Deusdedit  and  after  him  Damiaii,  the  sixth  and 
seventh  Archbishops  of  Canterbury,  were  each  con- 
secrated by  Ithamar,  Bishop  of  Rochester.  Of  course 
these  two  dignitaries  and  all  the  Bishops  consecrated 
by  them,  and  all  who  have  derived  orders  from  them 
down  to  the  present  day,  have  been  mere  "probable 
Bishops ;"  and  the  people  who  have  received  the 
ordinances  directly  or  indirectly  from  them,  have 
received  only  "probable"  ordinances,  and  have  been 
at  most  only  probably  baptized,  probably  regenerat- 
ed, and  probably  saved. 

'Among  the  canonical  disqualijications  for  holy 
orders,  (see  page  122,)  one  is  "being  under  age." 
According  to  Bower,  Pope  John  the  Tenth  con- 
firmed the  election  of  Hugh,  son  of  Count  Hubert,  in 
925,  to  the  Archbishopric  of  Rheims,  though  he  was 
scarcely  Jive  years  old ;  and  he  was  consecrated 
in  a  council  of  Bishops  at  Soissons  when  he  was 
only  eighteen  years  of  age.  John  the  Twelfth  was 
made  Pope  in  956,  when  he  was  only  eighteen, 
and  retained  the  Popedom  for  seven  years,  when  he 
was  deposed.  Among  other  charges  brought  against 
him  before  the  council,  and  which  were  not  contra- 
dicted, "  John,  Bishop  of  Narin,  and  John  Cardinal 
Deacon,  attested,  that  they  had  seen  him  ordain  a 
deacon  in  a  stable ;  and  Benedict,  deacon,  with  other 
deacons  and  priests,  said  that  they  knew  for  certain 
that  he  had  ordained  Bishops  for  money,  and  had, 
among  the  rest,  ordained  a  child  but  ten  years  old 
bishop  of  Todi."i — It  is  susceptible  of  proof  that 
there  were  many  similar  ordinations  during  succes- 
sive centuries. 

1  Bower  Vol.  V.  108. 
13 


146  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

Calvin,  in  his  Institutes,  says:  —  "Even  boys, 
scarcely  ten  years  of  age,  have  by  the  permission  of 
the  Pope,  been  made  Bishops."  Again,  he  exclaims 
indignantly,  "Is  it  tolerable  even  to  hear  the  name 
of  pastors  given  to  men  who  have  forced  them  into 
the  possession  of  a  Church  as  into  an  enemy's  farm; 
who  have  obtained  it  by  a  legal  process;  who  have 
pm'chased  it  with  money;  who  have  gained  it  by 
dishonourable  services;  who,  ivhile  infants  just  be- 
ginning  to  lisjJ,  succeeded  to  it  as  an  inheritance 
transmitted  by  their  uncles  and  cousins,  and  some- 
times even  by  fathers  to  their  illegitimate  children  P"^ 
Nay,  Rome  has  even  had  a  hoy-Pope.  According 
to  Dr.  Inett,  Benedict  IX.,  "when  a  boy  of  about 
ten  or  twelve  years  of  age,"  was  chosen  Pope,  and 
though  a  most  profligate  lad,  he  continued  for  nearly 
eleven  years  to  discharge  "all  the  functions  incum- 
bent on  a  Bishop  of  Rome."^ 

Another  canonical  disqualification  for  orders  is 
Simony.  2  "  If  any  bishop,  priest,  or  deacon,  obtain  his 
dignity  by  money,  let  him,  and  let  him  who  ordained 
him  be  deposed  and  wholly  cut  off  from  communion, 
as   Simon  Magus  was  by   Peter."'*      "  Whosoever 

1  Book  IV.  Ch.  5.  2  Orig.  Anglic.  I.  384. 

3  It  is  common  to  hear  Prelatists  say,  that  notwithstanding  many 
of  the  Bishops  and  Popes  have  been  bad  men,  they  were  regularly 
ordained,  and  therefore  the  succession  is  not  broken.  But  We  show, 
not  simply  that  they  were  "bad  men,*'  but  that  according  to  the 
highest  ecclesiastical  authorities  recognized  in  the  Romish  and  Eng- 
lish Churches,  they  were  utterly  disqualified  for  holy  orders.  Let 
them  show,  if  they  can,  for  example,  liow  the  succession  could  be 
perpetuated  by  the  crowds  of  simoniacs  who  pretended  to  receive  and 
give  orders  during  the  middle  ages,  when  canons  enough  to  fill  a 
volume  have  been  adopted  by  different  councils,  certifying  that  "  all 

ORDERS  CONFERRED  FOR  MONEY  ARE  NULL  AND  VOID." 

4  Apost.  Canons,  No.  22. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  147 

either  sell  or  buy  holy  orders  cannot  be  priests.  .  .  . 
There  is  no  power  in  ordination,  where  buying  and 
seUing  prevail." ^  '^  Wliatever  holy  orders  are  ob- 
tained by  money,  either  given  or  promised  to  be 
given,  we  declare  that  they  were  null  from  the  begin- 
ning, and  never  had  any  vaUdity."^  There  are 
authorities  and  examples  enough  that  belong  to  this 
head,  to  fill  a  volume.  If  Simony  will  destroy  the 
succession,  there  is  not  an  Episcopal  minister  in 
Britain  or  America  ivho  can  show  that,  he  has,  on 
High- Church  principles,  the  least  right  ivhatever  to 
preach  the  gospel.  Take  these  instances  which  have 
been  collected  chiefly  by  Dr.  Brown,  and  are  given 
in  his  valuable  work  on  "  Puseyite  Episcopacy." 
Bower  states  that  "on  the  death  af  Boniface  II.,  in 
531,  Simony  reigned  without  mask  or  disguise. 
Votes  were  publicly  bought  and  sold,  and  money  was 
offered  to  the  senators  themselves."  Baronius  says 
of  Vigilius,  when  he  was  Anti-Pope,  that  "  he  was 
not  only  a  second  Lucifer,  striving  to  ascend  into 
heaven,  and  exalt  his  throne  above  the  stars,  but,  by 
the  weight  of  his  enormous  sacrileges  and  heinous 
crimes,  brought  down  to  hell,  a  schismatic,  a  simo- 
niacj  a  murderer,  not  the  successor  of  Simon  Peter, 
but  of  Simon  Magus,  not  the  vicar  of  Christ,  but  an 
Anti-Christ,  an  idol  set  up  in  the  temple  of  God,  a 
wolf,  a  thief,  and  a  robber;"  though  when  he  was 
elevated  to  the  Popedom,  he  makes  him  a  good  Ca- 
tholic. "  In  the  time  of  this  Pope,"  says  Franco witz, 
speaking  of  the  monster  Sergius,  who  lived  in  the 
ninth  century,  "  and  of  his  brother  (Benedict),  bishop- 
rics were  disposed  of  by  public  salc;^^  and  in  the 
tenth  century-,  "  no  one  was  provided  for  or  created 

'  Canon  Law,  by  Gratian.  «  Council  of  Placentia,  Can.  2. 


148  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

a  Bishop,  unless  he  paid  for  it,  or  bound  himself  to 
do  so  under  the  most  tremendous  penalties."  He 
further  states,  in  reference  to  the  eleventh  century, 
that  ^^  most  of  the  bishops  and  abbots  in  Germany 
had  fallen  from  their  dignities  through  Simony,  and 
that  three  of  the  Popes,  Benedict  IX.,  Silvester  III., 
and  Gregory  VI.,  had  procured  the  Popedom  by  mo- 
ney." Matthew  Paris  affirms  that  in  the  thirteenth 
century,  simony  was  committed  in  the  Church  of 
England  without  shame.  Clemangis  in  his  book  on 
Simoniacal  Prelates,  says  of  the  Bishops,  that  "  they 
set  a  price  upon  all  orders,  which  if  it  be  not  paid, 
they  will  admit  no  person  into  orders,  though  he  be 
never  so  well  qualified  by  his  life,  manners,  or  learn- 
ing. The  Church  is  now  become  a  shop  of  merchan- 
dize, or  rather  of  robbery  and  rapine,  in  which  all  the 
sacraments  are  exposed  to  sale.'^  Calvin  makes  this 
deliberate  declaration  as  to  the  state  of  things  in  the 
Papal  Church  in  his  day:^"  I  maintain  that  scarcely 
one  belief  ce  in  a  hundred,  in  all  the  Papacy,  is  at 
present  conferred  without  Simony,  according  to  the 
definition  which  the  ancients  gave  of  that  crime. "^ 
To  add  but  one  more  instance  out  of  a  multitude, — 
Platina  says  that  Pope  Nicholas,  III.  robbed  others, 
to  enrich  his  own  relations.  ^'  He  took  away  by  vio- 
lence the  castles  of  certain  Roman  nobles,  and  gave 
them  to  his  own  relatives."  This  pontifical  "  robber" 
ordained  John  Peckham,  one  of  the  ^Archbishops  of 
Canterbury.  Bishop  Godwin  says,  "  that  Peckham 
had  hardly  arrived  in  England,  when  the  Pope,  his 
^  creator,^  (for  so  he  was  pleased  to  call  him,)  required 
a  large  sum  of  money  from  him,  viz.  four  thousand 
marks."     Peckham's  answer  was  as  follows:  "  Be- 

i  Inst.  B.  IV.  ch.  5. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  149 

hold!  thou  hast  created  me,  and  forasmuch  as  it  is 
natural  for  a  creature  to  desire  to  be  perfected  by  his 
creator,  so,  in  my  distresses,  I  desire  to  be  refreshed 
by  your  Holiness.  Truly  a  writ  of  execution,  horrible 
to  be  seen  and  terrible  to  be  heard,  has  latel^r  reached 
me,  declaring  that  except  I  answer  to  it  within  a 
month  after  the  feast  of  St.  Michael,  by  paying  into 
the  hands  of  the  merchants  of  Lucca,  the  sum  of  four 
thousand  marks,  according  to  my  bargain  with  the 
Court  of  Rome,  I  am  then  to  be  excommunicated, 
and  am  to  be  cursed  in  my  own  and  other  principal 
churches,  with  bell,  book  and  candles." 

Such  are  the  men  through  whom  the  High-Church 
-Ministers  and  Prelates  of  our  day,  with  so  much  com- 
placency, pretend  to  trace  their  lineage  to  the  Apos- 
tles !  The  degraded  creature  last  mentioned,  as  an 
archbishop  of  Canterbury,  who  addressed  the  Pope 
as  his  "  Creator,"  and  confessed  that  he  obtained  his 
see  by  Simony,  is  one  of  the  bishops  mentioned  on 
a  catalogue  circulated  in  this  country,  which  professes 
to  give  the  names  of  an  unbroken  series  of  Prelates 
extending  from  the  Apostle  John,  down  to  the  late 
venerable  Bishop  White. ^  The  question  may  well 
be  asked,  in  reference  not  only  to  this  case,  but  to  the 
general  prevalence  oi  ^ivciOWY  for  ages  in  the  Church 

1  This  list,  like  all  others,  traces  the  English  and  American  sue 
cession  through  the  Arch-bishops  of  Canterbury.  Yet  Dr.  Inett,  the 
Episcopal  historian,  in  his  Origines  Anglicanae,  says  that  "  the  diffi- 
culties in  the  Succession  in  the  See  of  Canterbury,  betwixt  the  years 
768  and  800,  are  invincible;"  Episcopalians  are  obliged,  in  the  face 
of  this  candid  and  pregnant  confession,  to  assume — and  that  in  a 
matter  involving,  on  High-Church  principles,  their  salvation — that 
during  the  thirty-two  years  embraced  in  this  chaotic  period,  the  suc- 
cession was  canonically  preserved. 

13* 


150  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

of  Rome,  if  Simony  invalidates  orders,  what  authari- 
ty  had  the  first  Bishops  in  the  United  States,  and  by 
unavoidable  consequence  all  whom  they  have  ordain- 
ed or  consecrated,  to  minister  in  holy  things?  For 
the  simoniacal  Prelates  of  the  Roman  Church  could 
not  transmit  orders  they  did  not  possess;  and  as  their 
own  orders  were  "null  and  void  from  the  beginning," 
so  must  have  been  all  those  of  their  successors. 

Again:  Heresy  is  a  disqualification  for  sacred 
orders.  But  Pope  Liberius  was  (as  the  Roman  Ca- 
tholics acknowledge)  an  Arian.  Pope  Marcellinus 
sacrificed  to  idols.  Pope  Leo  was  an  Avian,  Picus 
of  Mirandula  says,  he  remembers  a  Pope  who  believed 
no  God;  and  had  heard  of  another  who  owned  that 
*'he  did  not  believe  the  immortality  of  the  soul.'' ^ 
"  Pope  Sylvester  II.,  was  made  Pope  by  necromancy .> 
and  in  recompense  thereof,  promised  both  body  and 
soul  to  the  devil." 

Another  disqualification,  laid  down  by  the  canons, 
is  IMMORALITY.  It  is  supcrfluous  to  add  after  the 
testimonies  already  presented,  that  the  whole  history 
of  the  Papal  See,  down  at  least  to  the  middle  of  the 
sixteenth  century,  is  replete  with  scenes  of  appalling 
corruption  and  wickedness.  Baronius,  in  speaking  of 
the  tenth  -century,  says,  that  the  men  who  theu  occu- 
pied the  See  of  St.  Peter,  were  "  not  Pontiffs,  but 
monsters.''''  Platina  states  that  Clement  II.,  a.  d. 
1048,  "was  poisoned  with  poison  prepared,  as  was 
supposed,  by  his  successor.  Pope  Damasus  II."  John 
IX.,  John  XIII.,  Sixtus  IV.,  and  Alexander  VI.,  were 
defiled  with  all  manner  of  vices.  "  Boniface  VII.," 
says  Baronius,  "  was  rather  a  thief,  a  murderer,  and 
a  traitor  to  his  country,  than  a  Pope."     And  of 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  151 

Gregory  VIL,  he  says,  "  He  had  jjoisoned  some  six 
or  seven  Popes,  by  Brazutus,  before  he  could  get  the 
Popedom  huTiself." 

I  will  not  enlarge  this  catalogue.  The  records  of 
the  Papal  See  are  too  polluted  to  be  unrolled.  I 
am  obliged  to  omit  even  the  statements  of  eminent 
Roman  historians  and  dignitaries,  on  this  subject, 
because  their  language  will  not  bear  to  be  repeated. 
I  will  only  add  the  brief  portraiture  Calvin  has  given 
of  the  Romish  clergy  of  his  time.  "There  is  no 
class  of  men  in  the  present  day,  more  infamous  for 
profusion,  delicacy,  luxury,  and  profligacy  of  every 
kind ;  no  class  of  men  contains  more  apt  or  expert 
masters  of  every  species  of  imposture,  fraud,  treachery, 
and  perfidy ;  no  where  can  be  found  equal  cunning 
or  audacity  in  the  commission  of  crime.  I  say  noth- 
ing of  their  pride,  haughtiness,  rapacity  and  cruelty; 
I  say  nothing  of  the  abandoned  licentiousness  of  every 
part  of  their  lives ; — enormities  which  the  world  is  so 
wearied  with  bearing,  that  there  is  no  room  for  the 
least  apprehension  lest  I  should  be  charged  with  ex- 
cessive exaggeration.  One  thing  I  assert,  which  it  is 
not  in  their  power  to  deny — that  there  is  scarcely  one 
of  the  Bishops,  and  not  one  in  a  hundred  of  the 
parochial  clergy,  who,  if  sentence  were  to  be  passed 
upon  his  conduct  according  to  the  ancient  canons, 
would  not  be  excommunicated,  or,  at  the  very  least, 

deposed  from  his  office Now  let  all  who  fight 

under  the  standards  and  auspices  of  the  Roman  See, 
go  and  boast  of  their  sacerdotal  order.  It  is  evident 
that  the  order  which  they  have,  is  not  derived  from 
Christ,  from  his  Apostles,  from  the  fathers,  or  from 
the  ancient  Church."  ^     Most  men  would  be  likely  to 

'  Inbt.  ut.  sup. 


152  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

concur  with  Calvin  in  this  last  remark;  and  yet, 
according  to  the  doctrine  now  so  assiduously  thrust 
upon  the  public  attention,  these  men — these  simoni- 
Acs,  and  drunkards,  and  debauchees,  and  thieves, 
and  MURDERERS — these  are  the  successors  of  the 
APOSTLES ;  and  through  them  the  Holy  Ghost  has 
BEEN  transmitted  to  the  Bishops  of  our  day  !  The 
Episcopal  Church  is  a  Church  because  its  Prelates 
are  in  a  line  which  connects  them  with  the  Apostles 
through  all  these  monsters  in  wickedness!  And  if 
the  Holy  Ghost  has  not  been  transmitted  through 
these  men — if  their  own  orders  were  invalid,  so  that 
not  having  received  this  precious  "  gift"  they  failed 
to  communicate  it  to  those  wliom  they  ordained — the 
succession  of  course  has  been,  in  every  such  instance, 
destroyed.  And  what  Episcopal  minister  or  Prel- 
ate can  possibly  prove  that  his  own  orders  have  not 
inherited  the  taint  of  a  fatal  informality  from  one  of 
these  Judas-like  Apostles? 

There  is  still  another  topic  to  be  briefly  noticed  in 
this  connexion,  viz.  the  schisms  in  the  Popedom.  It 
is  well  known  that  these  have  been  frequent  and  pro- 
tracted, continuing  sometimes  for  forty  years.  There 
have  been,  at  different  periods,  two,  three,  and  four 
pretended  Popes  at  a  time,  mutually  excommuni- 
cating and  anathematizing  each  other.  What  be- 
comes of  the  orders  conferred  by  them  in  this  state  of 
things?  Are  they  all  valid?  And  if  not,  how  is  any 
modern  Bishop  to  ascertain  whether  his  orders  are 
dejived  from  a  Pope  or  an  anti-Pope  ?  To  take  an 
example.  Plegmund,  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  a.  d. 
891,  was  ordained  by  Pope  Formosus.  Stephen 
VI.,  the  successor  of  Formosus,  at  the  head  of  his 
council,  having  declared  the  ordinations  which  he  had 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  153 

administered,  void,  caused  those  whom  he  had  or- 
dained to  be  re-ordained.  Sergius  III.  renewed  all 
that  Stephen  had  done  against  Formosus,  and  deposed 
all  such  as  he  had  consecrated. — Now  Plegmimd 
was  never  re-ordained.  And  yet  he  ordained  most 
of  the  Bishops  in  England  for  twenty-six  years. 

Again,  Henry  Chichley  was  ordained  Archbishop 
of  Canterbury,  a.  d.  1414,  by  Gregory  XII.  Gregory 
was  one  of  the  three  j^retenders  to  the  Popedom,  and 
in  the  end  was  deposed  by  the  Council  of  Constance. 
"  Yet  Chichley  received  his  Episcopal  succession  from 
this  Gregory  who  was  pronounced  by  a  council  to  be 
no  Pope  of  Rome,  no  Bishop  at  all;  and  he,  Chichley, 
continued  to  communicate  ihesQ  false  orders  to  the 
English  Bishops  and  Archbishops,  even  in  the  fifteenth 
deniiwy  J  for  tiventy -nine  years. '^  What  becomes  of 
the  succession  in  these  cases? 

It  is  no  sufficient  answer  to  this  question  to  say, 
that  a  man  may  be  a  true  Bishop,  although  he  is  not 
a  true  Pope ;,  and  that  the  rival  Bishops  who  at  differ- 
ent times  contended  for  the  Popedom,  each  possessed 
the  right  of  ordination,  so  that  the  ordinations  per- 
formed by  tliem  are  valid.  For,,  in  the  first  place, 
the  rights  of  ordination  and  deposition  are  correlative ; 
and  if,  as  in  the  instances  just  cited,  their  ordinations 
were  vahd,  so  were  their  depositions.  But,  secondly, 
the  false  Popes  in  every  contest  of  the  kind  mention- 
ed, (and  there  were  thirteen  such  contests  within  a 
thousand  years)  were  evidently  guilty  of  schism  of 
the  most  flagrant  character;  and  this,  on  High-Church 
principles,  nullified  the  orders  they  conferred. 

Equally  futile  is  the  plea  employed  to  elude  the 
argument  drawn'  from  the  immoral  characters  of 

iPowell,  p.  235. 


154  THE    HIGH-CIIURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

many  of  the  Popes  and  Bishops. — "  Ordination,"  it  is 
argued,  "does  not  depend  on  the  character  of  the 
ordainer,  but  on  the  vahdity  of  his  own  orders.  Tlie 
ordinations,  therefore,  performed  by  these  men  were 
vahd,  although  they  were  bad  men." — I  answer,  that 
the  principle  here  laid  down  must  be  allowed,  to  a 
certain  extent.  As  we  cannot  read  the  hearts  of  men, 
no  individual  could  be  certain  that  he  was  properly 
ordained,  if  the  validity  of  the  act  depended  upon  its 
being  done  by  a  truly  holy  man.  But  to  admit  this 
principle  without  limitation,  is  equally  at  variance 
with  Scripture  and  abhorrent  to  reason.  That  some 
are  prepared  to  do  this,  is  evident  from  the  fact  that 
a  late  writer  on  the  Apostolical  Succession,  refers  to 
the  case  oi  Judas  m  terms  which  import  a  belief  that 
he  retained  the  plenary  powers  of  the  apostleship 
after  his  betrayal  of  the  Saviour  ^  Whereas  the  New 
Testament  states  that  by  that  act  he  '■'■felV^  from  his 
"apostleship." 2     Such  writers,  however,  and  all  who 

'  See  "  Percival  on  the  Apostolic  Succession."  Speaking  of  Judas, 
he  says,  "  Not  only  did  our  Lord  so  call  him,  (i.  e.  as  an  Apostle) 
and  so  employ  him,  but  Ztzs  bishopric  was  not  filled  up  till  after  his 
death.''''  (p.  51.)  Yet  in  enumerating  the  Bishops  at  the  period  of 
Elizabeth's  accession  who  had  been  "  canonically  consecrated,"  he 
says,  "Bonner,  Bishop  of  London,  and  Thirlby,  of  Ely,  were  inca- 
pacitated''^  for  assisting  in  a  consecration :  and  the  first  reason  he 
assigns  for  it,  is,  that  ''  they  had  been  instrumental  in  the  murder  of 
their  Metropolitan.''''  It  might  be  invidious  to  ask  whether  in  the 
judgment  of  Mr.  Percival,  this  crime  was  of  a  deeper  dye  than  that 
of  Judas.  But  we  may  ask,  if  murder  "  incapacitates"  a  Bishop  and 
nullifies  bis  orders,  what  becomes  of  all  the  orders  (and  his  own  are 
quite  likely  to  be  of  this  class)  derived  from  the  Popes  of  the  Borgia 
family  and  others  who  are  proved  to  have  been  murderers,  and  one 
of  whom  poisoned  six  or  seven  competitors? 

2  Acts  i.  25.  "  That  he  may  take  part  of  this  ministry  and  apostle- 
ship, from  which  Judas  by  transgression  fell." 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  155 

hold  with  them,  are  at  issue  with  the  ecclesiastical 
canons  and  innumerable  decisions  of  councils — the  sort 
of  authorities  they  usually  reverence  most — which,  as 
I  have  shown,  specify  the  very  crimes  these  pretended 
Popes  and  Bishops  were  guilty  of,  as  nullifying 
ORDERS.  The  question,  it  will  be  observed,  does  not 
respect  the  official  acts  of  one  or  two,  or  a  few  Pre- 
lates and  Popes,  scattered  along  the  fine  of  the  Church 
at  remote  intervals;  but  whole  tribes  of  boy-bishops, 

SCHISMATICS,  INFIDELS,  DRUNKARDS,  SENSUALISTS,    Sl- 

MONiAcs,  USURPERS,  and  APOSTATES.  It  has  respect 
to  a  CHURCH  pronounced  apostate  by  the  Church  of 
England  herself,  and  by  the  predecessors  of  those  pre- 
lates who  are  now  so  strenuous  in  vindicating  the 
integrity  of  that  "apostleship"  which  Rome  has  trans- 
mitted to  them.  Is  there  any  thing  in  the  Word  of 
God,  or  even  in  the  decrees  of  councils,  to  show  that 
^uch  men  as  these  can  be  true  ministers  of  Christ,  or 
to  legitimate  the  orders  conferred  by  them? 

The  historical  facts  which  have  been  adduced,  show 
that  the  pretended  Prelatical  Succession  is  a  chain  of 
sand.  This  conclusion  may  be  still  further  fortified 
by  a  brief  reference  to  the  separation  that  took  place 
between  the  Romish  and  Anglican  Churches  at  the 
Reformation.  I  have  proved  that  the  Church  of  Eng- 
land derives  the  Succession  (in  so  far  as  she  has  it) 
from  the  Church  of  Rome.  But  the  English  Reform- 
ers with  one  accord,  pronounce  the  Church  of  Rome 
an  antichristian  and  apostate  Church.  I  omit  quo- 
tations from  their  writings  in  evidence  of  this,  as  it  will 
not  be  questioned.  It  is  proper,  however,  to  show 
that  Rome  is  declared  to  be  apostate  not  merely  by 
the  English  Reformers  as  individuals,  but  by  the 
Church  of  England  herself.     The  Books  of  Homilies 


156  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

are  said  in  the  35th  Article  of  that  Church,  to  con- 
tain "  a  godly  and  wholesome  doctrine,"  and  are 
"judged  (suitable)  to  be  read  in  churches  by  the  min- 
isters diligently  and  distinctly,  that  they  may  be  un- 
derstandcd  of  the  people."  These  Homilies  say  ^  of 
th5  Church  of  Rome,  that  she  is  "not  only  an  Harlot, 
as  the  Scripture  calleth  her,  but  also  a  foul,  filthy, 
old,  ivithered  Harlot ;  the  foulest  and  filthiest 
THAT  EVER  WAS  SEEN  i" — and  that,  "as  it  at  present 
is,  and  hath  been  for  nine,  hundred  years,  it  is  so  far 
from  the  nature  of  the  true  Church,  that  nothing 
CAN  BE  MORE."  It  is  from  a  Church  which  their  own 
standards  brand  with  apostacy  in  these  strong  terms, 
and  which  the  word  of  God  describes  as  the  "  mother 
OF  HARLOTS,"  that  EugUsh  and  American  Prelatists 
derive  their  orders.  If  they  allege  that  the  Romish 
Church  had  not  become  apostate  at  the  period  of  the 
Reformation,  this  will  be  to  contradict  their  own 
standards.  But  even  conceding  the  point  for  the 
sake  of  argument,  how  is  their  separation  from 
Rome  to  be  vindicated?  To  pretend  that  they  "did 
not  separate  from  her,"  is  to  presume  very  largely 
upon  the  public  ignorance  or  credulity.  The  fact  of 
their  leaving  the  Romish  Church,  is  as  well  estab- 
lished as  the  fact  of  the  Reformation  itself— a  fact 
which  their  Reformers,  the  very  men  engaged  in 
effecting  the  separation,  never  thought  of  denying. — 
In  the  judgment  of  High-Churchmen,  there  is  no 
greater  sin  than  schism.  A  single  passage  out  of 
many  that  could  be  cited  from  a  late  Episcopal  writer 
of  acknowledged  authority,  will  show  this.  "  Volun- 
tary separation  from  the  Church  of  Christ  is  a  sin 
against  our  brethren,  against  ourselves,  against  God; 

•Pp.  162.295. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  157 

a  sill  which,  unless  repented  of,  is  eternally  destruc- 
tive to  the  souL  The  heinous  nature  of  this  offence  is 
incapable  of  exaggeration,  because  no  human  imagi- 
nation, and  no  human  tongue  can  adequately  describe 
its  enormity."!  But  if  the  Roman  Church  was  not 
apostate,  the  Church  of  England  is,  on  High-Church 
principles,  involved  in  all  the  guilt  of  this  sin,  for  sepa- 
rating from  her ;  and,  of  course,  Aer  orders  are  null 
and  void. — It  is  worthy  of  special  notice  in  this  con- 
nexion that  the  English  Reformers  admitted  that  their 
church  had  not  an  unbroken  succession.  The  want 
of  such  a  succession  was  charged  upon  them  by  the 
Romanists  at  the  time,  as  a  proof  that  their  church 
was  not  a  true  church.  In  no  one  instance,  in  so  far 
as  my  researches  have  gone,  did  they  deny  the  fact. 
Taught  in  a  different  school  from  many  who  are  now 
enjoying  the  fruits  of  their  toils  and  sufferings,  and 
with  widely  different  views  of  the  plan  of  salvation, 
they  admitted  the  fact,  and  maintained,  from  reason, 
from  the  Fathers,  and  from  the  Word  of  God,  that  no 
such  succession  was  essential  to  constitute  a  true 
church  and  ministry. ^  Every  reader  must  decide  for 
himself  whether  the  High-Churchmen  of  the  present 
day  or  the  Reformers  themselves,  are  the  best  wit- 
nesses in  settling  the  questions  of /rtc/,  whether  the 
English  church  separated  from  Rome,  and  whether, 
in  doing  this,  she  kept  the  Prelatical  Succession  un- 
broken. 

Without  waiting  to  see  how  our  Prelatical  friends 
are  to  get  their  Apostolical  chain  across  the  gulf  be- 
tween Rome  and  themselves,  created  by  the  Reforma- 

1  Palmer  on  the  Church,  vol.  i.  70. 

2  See  Chap.  VI. 

14 


158  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

tion,  I  shall  now  glance  at  some  of  the  links  which 
lie  on  this  side  of  that  abyss. 

The  first  fact  worthy  of  notice  here,  is,  that  the 
Church  of  England  only  exchanged  one  Pope  for 
another.  Henry  VIII.  vested  in  himself  that  spiritual 
supremacy  of  the  Church,  of  which  he  despoiled  the 
Roman  Pontiff.  He  even  went  so  far  as  to  suspend 
all  the  Prelates  in  England  from  the  exercise  of  their 
functions.  He  afterwards  issued  new  commissions  to 
them,  in  which  it  was  distinctly  specified  that  they 
were  to  regard  themselves  as  the  mere  vicars  of  the 
crown.  The  following  is  a  summary  of  one  of  these 
instruments: — "Since  all"  authority,  civil  and  eccle- 
siastical, flows  from  the  crown,  and  since  Cromwell," 
(a  layman,  but  made  vicar  general  in  spiritualibus 
over  all  the  clergy,)  "'  to  whom  the  ecclesiastical  part 
has  been  committed,"  [vices  nostras,  as  the  vicar  of 
the  crown,)  "  is  so  occupied  that  he  cannot  fully  exer- 
cise it,  we  commit  to  you  (each  individual  Prelate) 
the  license  of  ordaining,  granting  institution,  and 
collation,  and  in  short,  of  performing  all  other  eccle- 
siastical acts:  and  we  allow  you  to  iiold  this  authority 
during  our  pleasure,  as  you  must  answer  to  God  and 
to  us." — Similar  commissions  were  granted  by  Ed- 
ward VI.  to  his  Prelates.  The  act  vesting  the  spiritual 
supremacy  of  the  Church  in  the  crown,  was  revived 
under  Elizabeth,  and  has  never  been  repealed. — 
Whether  a  succession  which  comes  through  a  series 
of  Bishops,  who  were  virtually  made  and  unmade  at 
the  pleasure  of  a  capricious  and  sensual  monarch  like 
Henry  VIII ,  is  quite  untainted,  is  a  question  worthy 
the  attention  of  our  High-Church  canonists.  Leav- 
ing that,  however,  it  may  be  observed  that  able 
canonists  are  to  this  day  at  issue  in  relation  to  the 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  159 

validity  of  an  ordination  on  which  all  the  orders  of 
the  Church  of  England  and  the  Episcopal  Church 
in  this  country  are  suspended, — I  refer  to  the  case  of 
Archbishop  Parker,  consecrated  to  the  See  of  Can- 
terbury in  the  reign  of  Elizabeth.  This  consecration 
was  performed  by  four  persons,  to-wit:  Barlow  and 
Scory,  Bishops  elect  of  Chichester  and  Hereford, 
Miles  Coverdale,  formerly  Bishop  of  Exeter,  and 
Hodgkins,  Suffragan  of  Bedford.  The  validity  of  the 
act  has  been  denied  on  two  grounds.  The  first  is  the 
alleged  incompetency  of  the  ordainers.  Three  of 
these.  Barlow,  Scory,  and  Coverdale,  who  were  or- 
dained in  the  time  of  Edward  VI.,  had  been  deprived 
by  his  successor,  "Bloody  Mary."  They  were  at 
this  time  without  Sees,  and,  therefore,  incompetent, 
according  to  the  canons,  to  exercise  Episcopal  func- 
tions. The  fourth  was  a  mere  Suffragan,  or  assistant, 
who  had  also  been  deprived. — The  second  ground  ot 
objection  to  Parker's  consecration,  is,  that  it  was  per- 
formed according  io  an  insufficient  and  invalid  form. 
This  form  was  one  contained  in  the  Ordinal  of  King 
Edward:  and  was  in  these  words: — 

"Take  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  remember  that  thou 
stir  up  the  grace  of  God  which  is  in  thee  by  the  im- 
position of  hands ;  for  God  hast  not  given  us  the  spi- 
rit of  fear,  but  of  power,  and  love,  and  soberness." 

There  is  nothing  here,  it  will  be  perceived,  to  spe- 
cify the  order  that  was  conferred — nothing  to  express 
the  office  or  character  of  the  Episcopacy.  The  for- 
mula might  as  well  be  used,  as  one  of  the  Romish 
theologians  has  observed,  in  laying  hands  on  chil- 
dren, as  in  consecrating  a  Bishop.  This  defect  the 
Romanists  urged  at  the  time  as  fatal  to  the  validity 
of  Parker's  orders.     It  constitutes  the  chief  reason 


160  THE    HIGH-CHURCII    DOCTRINE    OF 

why  the  Romish  Cliiircfj  refuses  to  this  day  to  recog- 
nize the  EngUsh  ordinations,  ail  which  have  been 
derived  from  Parker.  The  objection  was  felt.  The 
Convocation  of  the  Church  of  England  which  sat 
in  1662,  endeavoured  to  remove  the  difficulty,  by 
changing  the  form  to  that  which  is  now  found  in  the 
prayer-book.  This  they  did  by  inserting  m  King 
Edward's  form,  the  words  marked  below  in  italics: 

"Receive  the  Holy  Ghost,  for  the  office  and  work 
of  a  Bishop  in  the  Church  of  God,  committed  unto 
thee  hy  the  imposition  of  our  hands ;  in  the  name 
of  the  Father  and  of  the  Son  and  of  the  Holy  Ghost; 
and  remember  that  thou  stir  up,''  &c. 

This  was  a  virtual  confession  of  the  insufficiency 
of  the  old  form.  But  unhappily  for  the  Anglican 
orders,  it  did  not  come  until  that  form  had  been  used 
for  a  century — long  enough  to  vitiate,  twice  over,  all 
the  orders  of  the  Church.  ^ 

There  was  another  weighty  objection  to  this  form, 
of  a  different  kind.  King  Edward's  Ordinal  had 
been  abolished  by  Mary,  and  Parliament,  at  the  time 
of  Parker's  consecration,  had  not  restored  it.  It  was, 
therefore,  a  dead  letter. 

All  these  objections  were  urged  then,  as  they  are 
now — and,  it  may  be  added,  as  they  ought  to  be  in 
arguing  with  men  who  suspend  the  salvation  of  the 
world  upon  matters  of  form.  That  they  were  not 
regarded  as  groundless  in  that  day  by  those  most 
deeply  concerned,  is  evident  from  the  fact  that  seven 
years  afterwards  it  was  deemed  expedient  to  procure 
an  act  of  parliament  ratifying  and  confirming  the  or- 
dinations of  Parker  and  those  whom  he  had  ordained. 

'  See  Bishop  Kenrick's  work  on  the  Validity  of  the  Anglican  Or- 
dinations. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  161 

Whether  a  retrospective  parliamentary  statute  could 
make  a  defective  ordination  valid,  is  a  point  upon 
which  there  will  probably  be  but  little  diiference  of 
opinion,  except  among  those  who  have  resolved  at 
all  hazards  to  make  out  an  unbroken  Prelatical  Suc- 
cession between  themselves  and  the  Apostles.  Plain 
people  who  have  not  been  able  to  see  that  such  a 
succession  is  essential  to  their  salvation,  will  be  very 
apt  to  think  thai  if  Parker  is  to  be  a  link  in  this  chain, 
there  is  at  least  one  link  with  a  very  ominous  flaw. 

It  might  reasonably  be  supposed  that  when  the 
English  succession  was  once  started,  all  further  uncer- 
tainty about  the  integrity  of  the  chain  would  be  at  an 
end.  One  would  hardly  suspect  that  a  taint,  however 
trivial,  could  creep  into  the  line  between  Parker  and 
our  day.  This  is  far  from  being  the  case,  however. 
Within  that  period,  many  individuals  have  been  ad- 
mitted to  orders,  and  some  to  the  highest  offices  in 
the  English  Church,  who  had  received  what  is  re- 
garded in  that  church  as  merely  lay-baptism.  It 
will  be  sufficient  to  specify  the  celebrated  Dr.  Butler, 
Bishop  of  Durham,  and  Archbishop  Seeker.  There 
is,  it  is  well  known,  a  difference  of  opinion  among 
Prelatists,  respecting  the  validity  of  lay-baptism, — 
under  which  head  they  include  all  baptisms  not  ad- 
ministered by  ministers  prelatically  ordained.  If  such 
baptisms  are  valid,  the  fact  adverted  to  does  not  in- 
validate tlie  succession.  But  lay-baptism  can  be 
proved  vahd  on  no  principles  which  will  not  equally 
legitimate  lay  ordination.  The  passage  of  Scripture 
is  yet  to  be  produced — whatever  may  be  found  in  the 
writings  of  the  Fathers — which  divorces  the  authority 
to  baptize  from  the  authority  to  preach  the  Gospel,  or- 
dain, and  exercise  all  the  other  functions  of  the  Chris- 

14^^ 


162  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

tian  ministry.  These  several  powers  are  conveyed  in 
one  and  the  same  commission:  *'  Go  jweacli  the  Gospel 
to  every  creature,  baptizing  them."  What  hint  have 
we  here,  or  elsewhere  in  the  word  of  God,  that  an  indi- 
vidual may  baptize  who  has  no  right  to  preach?  And 
with  what  reason  or  propriety  can  Prelatists  recognize 
Presbyterian  baptism,  who  refuse  to  recognize  Pres- 
byterian ordination?  We,  of  course,  maintain  that 
they  have  no  right  to  disallow  either;  as  we  do,  that 
they  have  no  warrant  for  recognizing  them  an  the 
ground  that  they  may  be  performed  by  laymen.  If 
they  are  admitted,  let  it  be  on  the  only  ground  which 
is  respectful  to  the  non-prelatical  churches,  or  sanc- 
tioned by  the  Scriptures,  viz.,  that  they  are  adminis- 
tered by  men  clothed  with  the  requisite  authority  to 
perform  them.  The  class  who  reject  baptism  per- 
formed hi  other  churches,  are  at  least  consistent. 
Whether  their  consistency  is  not  destructive  to  their 
exclusive  and  lordly  assumptions  in  claiming  for  pre- 
latical  churches  an  unbroken  Prelatical  Succession  and 
a  monopoly  of  the  gifts  and  graces  of  the  Spirit,  is 
another  question.  For  if  'lay-baptism^  be  invaUd, 
nothing  can  be  more  certain  than  that  the  pretended 
chain  of  Apostohcal  Succession  has  long  ago  been 
shivered  into  a  thousand  fragments. 

But  if  lay-baptism  be  vaUd,  it  will  hardly  be  con- 
tended that  no  baptism  at  all  is  valid :  and  this  grave 
defect,  with  another  no  less  serious,  unhappily  attaches 
to  the  ecclesiastical  character  of  an  Jirchbishop  of 
Canterbury^  who  died  no  longer  ago  than  1694;  I 
refer  to  the  celebrated  Dr.  Tillotson.  This  eminent 
man  was  the  son  of  a  Baptist,  and  of  cours3  Avas  not 
baptized  in  infancy.  No  evidence  has  ever  been 
produced  that  he  was  baptized  in  after  life.      The 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  163 

charge  that  he  was  imbaptized,  was  repeatedly  brought 
against  him  by.  the  non-jurors  during  his  primacy, 
and  never  disproved.  But  there  is  no  position  on 
which  High-Churchmen  insist  more  strenuously  than 
this,  viz.  that  no  unbaptized  person  is  or  can  possibly 
be  a  me'inher  of  the  Churchy  and  the  canons  are  ex- 
press that  a  person  in  this  predicament  is  incapable 
of  receiving  orders.  Tillotson,  therefore,  notwith- 
standing he  attained  to  the  chair  of  Canterbury, 
was  no  member  of  the  Church:  Unless,  then,  they 
are  prepared  to  maintain  that  orders  conferred  by 
an  individual  out  of  the  Church  are  valid,  all  the 
orders  conferred  by  him  and  those  transmitted  from 
the  individuals  he  ordained,  are  null  and  void.  Nor 
is  this  the  whole  difficulty  growing  out  of  Tillot- 
son's  case.  His  own  ord-ers  are  invalid  on  other 
grounds.  There  is  no  proof  that  he  was  ever  in  dea- 
con''s  orders^  but  good  reason  to  believe  he  was  not: 
and,  consequently,  by  the  10th  canon  of  the  comicil 
of  Sardica,  one  of  the  councils  whose  decrees  are  re- 
cognized as  binding  by  Prelatical  churches,  he  was 
not  capable  of  being  promoted  to  the  higher  grades 
of  the  priesthood.  Again  his  ordination  to  \hQ  priest- 
hood was  invalid.  He  was  ordained  by  Sysderf  of 
Galloway,  who  had  no  canonical  orders  himself,  and 
who  of  course  could  not  communicate  valid  orders  to 
others.  He  was  ordained  in  England,  where  Sysderf 
could  have  no  canonical  authority,  and  in  violation  of 
those ''  Apostolical  canons"  which  punish  with  deposi- 
tion both  the  Prelate  who  presumes  to  "ordain  in 
places  not  subject  to  him,"  and  those  who  submit  to  be 
ordained  by  him.  (See  above  p.  135.)  And,  finally, 
Sysderf's  whole  course  of  conduct  while  in  England, 
during  the  confusion  of  the  commonwealth  and  the 


164  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

civil  war,  was  schismatical  and  simoniacal.  For  we 
are  told  by  Birch,  Tillotson's  biographer,  that  he 
"  ordained  all  those  of  the  English  clergy  who  came 
to  him,  without  demanding  of  them  either  oaths  (of 
canonical  obedience)  or  subscriptions  (to  the  articles) ;" 
and  that  he  "  did  this  merely  for  a  subsistence  from 
i\ie  fees  for  the  letters  of  orders  granted  by  him — for 
he  was  poor  !"^  Tillotson's  orders,  then,  were  in- 
curably defective.  And  if  this  was  the  case,  what 
Episcopal  clergyman  in  England  or  America  can  be 
certain  that  the  taint  thus  introduced  into  the  succes- 
sion, has  not,  in  the  flow  of  a  stream  perpetually 
widening,  fatally  vitiated  his  own  orders  ? 

One  other  fact  respecting  the  period  now  under 
examination.  Mr.  Perceval,  a  High-Church  writer 
already  mentioned,  has  compiled  with  great  labour 
catalogues  of  the  English  Bishops  since  the  Refor- 
mation. Of  this  list  there  are  about  twenty  of  whose 
consecration  no  record  has  been  preserved!  That 
these  are  enough,  if  they  were  not  canonically  con- 
secrated, to  poison  the  whole  stream  of  succession, 
will  not  be  disputed.  Yet,  in  the  entire  absence  of 
evidence,  the  Episcopalian  is  obliged  \o  j)resume  that 
all  the  proceedings  pertaining  to  their  respective  or- 
dinations, were  canonical.  Archbishop  Whateley 
states,  in  a  passage  quoted  in  a  former  part  of  this 
chapter,  that  a  case  has  occurred  within  "  the  memo- 
ry of  persons  living,"  of  a  Prelate  concerning  whom 
"doubts  existed  in  the  minds  of  many  persons,  whe- 
ther he  had  ever  been  ordained  at  all." — It  is  mani- 
fest that  persons  who  have  received  orders  from  any 
of  the  Bishops  in  this  unfortunate  category,  can  have 
no  conclusive  evidence  that  they  are  in  orders  at  all.^ 

1  Vide  Presbjterian  Review,  Vol.  XIV.  12.  13.  2  Id.  p.  31. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  165 

The  Scottish  Succession,  from  which  the  earliest 
American  Bishop  (Seabury)  received  consecration,  is 
in  a  still  more  deplorable  condition.  There  are  no 
less  than  twenty-eight  Bishops  in  a  conthiuoiis  series 
on  Mr.  Perceval's  list,  embracing  a  period  of  twenty- 
six  years  (from  1662  to  16SS)  of  whose  consecration 
after  diligent  search  he  has  been  able,  as  he  tells  us 
"  with  regret,"  to  find  no  records  whatever.  The 
worthlessness  of  the  Scottish  Succession,  has  been 
demonstrated  by  recent  writers  with  a  redundancy 
of  evidence,  and  is  virtually  conceded  by  the  London 
Christian  Observer. ^  In  just  so  far,  therefore,  as  the 
Episcopal  orders  in  the  Diocese  of  Connecticut,  over 
which  Bishop  Seabury  presided,  and  in  other  parts 
of  the  Church,  have  been  derived  from  that  Prelate, 
they  partake  of  the  worthlessness  of  the  source  from 
which  they  sprung.  And  if,  in  addition  to  this,  the 
English  succession  has  also  failed — and  all  the  facts 
adduced  in  this  historical  inquiry,  bear  directly  upon 
this  point — the  orders  of  the  Episcopal  ministry  in 
this  country,  are,  on  High-Church  principles,  null 
and  void. 

Such  is  the  answer  of  History  to  the  question, 
"e^re  the  Episcopal  Bishops  of  our  day  the  true  and 
only  Successors  of  the  Apostles  ?^^  The  minuteness, 
perhaps  I  should  say,  the  tedious  minuteness,  of  the 
investigation,  seemed  to  be  rendered  necessary  by  the 
surprising  confidence  and  arrogant  tone  with  which 
High-churchmen  are  accustomed  to  assert  the  reality 
of  an  uninterrupted  Prelatical  Succession.  The  assu- 
rance they  display,  will  require  some  explanation  to 
those  who  contrast  it  with  the  overwhelming  mass 
of  testimony  which  Plistory  furnishes  against  their 

'  For  Nov,  1843. 


166  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

favourite  dogma.  With  one  class,  this  assurance  is 
clearly  the  offspring  of  ignorance.  They  have  taken 
up  the  dogma  on  the  credit  of  others,  without  exami- 
nation; and  have,  by  degrees,  come  to  be  as  stren- 
uous in  asserting  it,  as  those  from  whom  they  received 
it.  The  confidence  of  others  is  explained  by  a  single 
expression  in  this  sentence  from  the  pen  of  the  excel- 
lent Mr.  Bickersteth: — '^  The  idea  of  an  Apostolical 
Succession  only  by  Bishops  ordaining  in  a  regular 
series  from  the  times  of  the  Apostles  to  the  present 
time — the  idea  that  this  is  the  only  true  ministry  in 
the  Church  of  Christ,  and  essential  to  the  existence 
of  a  true  Church  of  Christ,  is  no  where  laid  down  in 
the  Scriptures,  and  no  where  inserted  in  our  Church 
Formularies :  to  trust  in  such  a  succession  is  an  idol  of 
the  Church  of  Rome."  This  idea  is  no  less  a  fond  con- 
ceit with  the  sort  of  Episcopalians  I  have  in  view.  The 
Apostolical  Succession  is  literally  an  ^'idoP^  with  them 
— one  of  their  divinities.  To  question  its  reality,  is  with 
them  akin  to  sacrilege.  That  is  not  a  point  to  be  argued, 
but  believed.  Argument  is  lost  upon  them.  Evidence 
produces  no  impression.  They  are  no  more  in  a 
condition  to  appreciate  the  one  or  the  other,  than  a 
foolish,  over-indulgent  parent  is  to  detect  the  foibles 
of  a  spoiled  child.  Both  are  blinded  by  a  passion 
which  subjugates  reason  and  judgment.  Persons  of 
this  description  must  be  left,  not,  indeed,  to  "uncove- 
nanted  mercy,"  but  to  such  providential  or  spiritual 
agencies  as  may  be  adequate  to  dissolve  the  spell  that 
is  upon  them  and  restore  the  use  of  their  suspended 
faculties. 

There  is,  however,  another  large  class  of  persons 
among  the  believers  in  this  doctrine,  who  are  acces- 
sible both  to  argument  and  evidence.     To  these,  as 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  167 

well  as  to  the  members  of  non-Prelatical  churches,  the 
historical  view  of  the  subject  may  be  useful.  To 
say  to  such  persons  that  the  theory  vanishes  the  mo- 
ment it  is  brought  to  the  test  of  history,  is  only  to  ex- 
press a  conviction  that  must  force  itself  upon  the  mind 
of  any  impartial  individual  who  will  go  into  the  ex- 
amination. If  the  views  presented  in  this  chapter  are 
to  be  relied  upon  —  if  the  facts  we  have  been  con- 
sidering are  facts — the  pretended  chain  of  succession 
is  an  "airy  nothing."  No  prudent  man  would  trust 
even  a  dollar  of  his  property  to  it,  much  less  his  soul. 
And  the  notion  that  the  very  being  of  the  Church, 
and  the  salvation  of  the  world  are  suspended  upon 
it,  deserves  to  be  classed  with  the  wildest  vagaries  of 
that  fanaticism  which  High-Churchmen  hold  in  such 
special  abhorrence.  That  this  theory  should  ever 
become  current  among  men  who  will  take  the  trouble 
to  investigate  it,  is  impossible.  It  was  not  designed 
for  a  Protestant  but  a  Papal  age.  It  is  part  of  that 
system  which  denies  the  Bible  to  the  people,  dis- 
courages education,  inculcates  an  ignorant  devotion, 
and  instead  of  teaching  men  to  repent  and  believe  for 
themselves,  commits  the  whole  business  of  their  salva- 
tion into  the  hands  of  a  priest.  Brought  out  into  the 
light  of  a  pure  Christianity,  its  deformity  becomes  ap- 
parent. Those  who  imagine  that  it  can  be  grafted  upon 
this  stock,  and  who  are  labouring  to  effect  the  unnatural 
union,  will  find  that  they  must  either  substitute  for 
their  favourite  dogma,  the  Scriptural  doctrine  of  the 
Apostolical  Succession,  viz.  the  succcession  of  the 
TRUTH,  or  transubstantiate  Christianity  into  Popery: — 
their  coalescence  by  any  other  process  is  an  impossibili- 
ty. Whether  this  process  is  likely  to  be  attempted,  and, 
if  so,  in  which  direction  the  change  is  to  be  made,  is 


168  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

a  question  that  may  be  incidentally  noticed  hereafter. 
Meanwhile,  in  confirmation  of  the  sentiment,  that  the 
dogma  of  an  unbroken  Prelatical  Succession  must  be 
spurned  as  destitute  of  the  least  warrant  from  his- 
tory, just  in  proportion  as  it  comes  to  be  examined 
and  understood,  let  me  quote  a  sentence  or  two  from 
an  English  Prelate,^  who  is  himself  one  of  the  links 
in  this  pretended  chain.  "  I  am  fully  satisfied  that 
till  a  consummate  stupidity  can  be  happily  estab- 
lished and  universally  spread  over  the  land,  there  is 
nothing  that  tends  so  much  to  destroy  all  respect  to 
the  clergy,  as  the  demand  of  more  than  can  be  due 
to  them;  and  nothing  has  so  efi'ectually  thrown  con- 
tempt upon  a  regular  succession  of  the  ministry,  as 
the  calling  no  succession  regular  but  what  was  un- 
interrupted; and  the  making  the  eternal  salvation  of 
Christians  to  depend  upon  that  uninterrupted  suc- 
cession of  which  the  most  learned  must  have  (he 
least  assurance,  and  the  unlearned  can  have  no  no- 
tion but  through  ignorance  and  credulity."  Others 
among  the  English  Bishops  have  held  similar  lan- 
guage. One  of  them,  Dr.  Whateley,  has  denounced  the 
whole  theory  as  unworthy  of  credit,  in  still  stronger 
terms.  And  the  present  Bishop  of  Hereford  uses 
this  language  in  a  late  charge : — "  You  will  exceed 
all  just  bounds,  if  you  are  continually  insisting  upon 
the  necessity  of  a  belief  in,  and  the  certainty  of  the 
Apostolic  Succession  in  the  Bishops  and  Presbyters 
of  our  church,  as  the  only  security  for  the  efiicacy  of 
the  sacraments;  so  that  those  who  do  not  receive 
them  from  men  so  accredited  and  approved  to  minis- 
ter, cannot  partake  of  the  promises  and  consolations 
of  the  Gospel,  and  are  therefore  in  peril  of  their  salva- 

*  Bishop  Hoadly. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  169 

tion,  and  left  to  the  uncovenanted  mercies  of  Gad, 
which  may  be,  in  the  end,  no  mercies  at  aJl  to  them." 
"  This,"  he  adds,  "  would  be  to  overstep  the  limits  of 
prudence  and  humility,  and  arrogantly  to  set  up  a 
claim  which  neither  Scripture,  nor  the  formularies 
and  various  offices  of  the  church,  nor  the  writings  of 
her  best  divines,  nor  the  common  sense  of  mankind, 
will  allow.  To  spread  abroad  this  notion,  would  be 
to  make  ourselves  the  derision  of  the  luorld.^^  It  is 
surely  an  edifying  spectacle  to  see  a  party  in  the  Epis- 
copal Church  pronouncing  multitudes  of  the  best  peo- 
ple in  the  world  to  be  out  of  the  way  of  salvation, 
for  rejecting  a  dogma  of  which  their  own  Bishops 
and  Archbishops  declare  that  the  more  a  man  studies, 
the  more  he  must  distrust  it;  that  no  one  can  assent 
to  it  except  through  ignorance  or  creduhty;  and  that 
for  a  minister  to  insist  upon  it,  is  to  make  himself 
"  the  derision  of  the  world."  Let  them  put  away 
this  folly,  and  abide  by  that  genuine  "Apostolic 
canon"  delivered  by  the  Apostle  Paul  to  their  fa- 
vourite Bishop,  Timothy,  "  Neither  give  heed  to 
fables  and  endless  genealogies,  which  minister 
questions,  rather  than  godly  edifying  which  is  in 
faith." 


15 


170  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 


CHAPTER  V. 


THE    SUCCESSION    TESTED    BY    FACTS. 

Having  tried  the  dogma  of  an  unbroken  Prelatical 
Succession  by  Scripture  and  History,  it  cannot  be 
deemed  invidious  if  we  also  test  it  by  facts. 

This  succession,  it  will  be  borne  in  mind,  is  held 
to  be  the  distinguishing  characteristic  of  a  true  Church 
and  a  lawful  ministry.  All  pretended  ministers  out 
of  the  line  of  the  succession,  are  usurpers  of  the  office. 
The  ordinances  of  ministers  prelatically  ordained  alone 
are  valid.  And  it  is  only  to  the  Church  as  governed 
by  the  Bishops,  the  successors  of  the  Apostles,  that 
the  assurance  is  given,  "Lo  I  am  with  you  always." 

Now  if  this  theory  be  well  founded,  we  have  a 
right  to  look  to  the  ministry  and  churches  in  the 
line  of  the  succession,  for  the  inflexible  maintenance 
of  sound  doctrine  and  a  uniform  exhibition  of  the 
benign  fruits  of  Christianity.  These  ministers  and 
churches  may  fairly  be  expected  to  display  the  purity 
and  power  of  the  Gospel  in  a  far  higher  degree 
than  the  non-episcopal  societies.  For  they  are  "  the 
Church,"  and  to  them  alone  is  the  Holy  Spirit  given. 
The  comparison  we  institute  is,  on  their  principles, 
(as  Dr.  Miller  has  remarked  in  one  of  his  works,)  "  a 
comparison  between  the  Church  of  Christ,  and  *  the 
world  that  lieth  in  wickedness.'  "  We  affirm  that 
there  ought  to  be  more  virtue  and  holiness,  more  con- 
cord, more  zeal  for  the  truth,  more  reverence  for  the 
word  of  God,  and  greater  activity  in  disseminating 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  171 

the  blessings  of  Christianity,  in  the  Church,  than  there 
are  out  of  it.  So  they  themselves  teach :  and  they 
are  perpetually  boasting  of  their  unity  and  primitive 
faith,  and  inviting  men  to  seek  repose  in  the  bosom 
of  "the  Church"  as  the  only  sanctuary  from  the  here- 
sies and  schisms  with  which  the  rest  of  Christendom 
is  distracted. 

We  are  constrained  in  self-defence  to  ask  whether 
these  pretensions  are  sustained  by  facts.  Is  it  true 
that  the  Prelatical  clergy,  say  in  our  own  country, 
are,  as  a  body,  so  superior  to  the  non-prelatical  minis- 
ters in  spiritual  endowments  and  in  fidelity  to  their 
duties,  as  we  have  a  right,  from  their  principles,  to 
expect?  We  not  only  concede  to  them  whatever  of 
persona]  excellence  and  pastoral  faithfulness  they  may 
lawfully  challenge,  but  we  rejoice  in  all  their  success 
in  winning  souls  to  Christ  and  edifyhig  his  people  in 
knowledge  and  holiness.  But  those  among  them 
who  are  most  distinguished  for  their  piety,  and  most 
laborious  in  the  service  of  their  Master,  would  be  the 
first  to  disclaim  for  themselves  and  their  brethren 
that  personal  pre-eminence  over  the  ministry  of  other 
churches,  which  the  High-Church  system  claims  for 
them.  A  similar  comparison  may  be  instituted  as 
regards  the  people.  Regeneration  and  justification 
are,  according  to  this  system,  tied  to  sacraments  ad- 
ministered by  a  Prelatic  ministry.  Then,  of  course, 
we  are  to  look  for  real  Christians — for  those  who 
have  been  pardoned,  renewed  and  sanctified — only 
in  Prelatic  churches.  To  suppose  that  the  Spirit  of 
God  would  render  the  ministrations  of  schismatlcal 
intruders''^  into  the  sacred  office,  equally  efficacious, 
or  nearly  so,  with  those  of  a  ministry  appointed  by 
himself,  is  preposterous  in  itself,  and  would  be  scouted 


172  THE    niGH-CHURCIi    DOCTRINE    OF 

as  an  impiety  by  every  consistent  High-Churchman; 
it  would,  indeed,  be  to  say  that  the  practical  results 
are  all  one,  whether  the  ordinances  employed  are 
valid  or  invalid.  But  is  it  true  that  all  the  enlight- 
ened, ardent  piety  among  the  laity  in  the  United 
States,  is  confined  to  the  Episcopal  and  Romish  com- 
munions? Is  it  true  that  a  larger  measure  of  the  life 
and  power  of  religion  is  to  be  found  in  those  commu- 
nions, than  in  other  Christian  denominations?  The 
laity  of  the  Episcopal  Church  will  not  affirm  this. 
Whatever  may  be  asserted  by  the  arrogant  and  indis- 
creet men  among  their  spiritual  guides,  who  have 
precipitated  their  Church  into  the  troubled  sea  where 
she  now  is,  they  will  not  easily  be  made  to  believe 
that  God  has  given  to  them  and  the  Romanists  a  mo- 
nopoly of  the  saving  benefits  of  Christianity.  Nor 
can  any  of  their  ministers  assert  it  without  maintain- 
ing the  absurd  and  bigoted  position  that  all  the  mani- 
festations of  faith  and  holiness  and  consecration  to 
Christ,  on  the  part  of  non-Episcopalians,  are  unreal 
and  deceptive. 

If,  then,  FACTS  under  our  own  observation  prove 
that  the  blessing  of  God  attends  the  labours  of  non- 
Prelatical,  equally  with  Prelatical  ministers,  and  that 
the  evidences  of  genuine  piety  are  found  in  at  least  as 
much  profusion  in  other  Churches  as  in  the  Episcopal 
communion,  with  what  show  of  reason  can  it  be  pre- 
tended that  the  Church  and  the  Spirit,  the  ministry 
and  sacraments,  the  promises  and  the  gifts  of  salva- 
tion, are  exclusively  finked  "by  covenant  and  oath" 
to  an  unbroken  Prelatical  Succession? 

The  view  I  have  taken  may  be  extended  to  other 
countries.  Compare  Presbyterian  Scotland  with  Pre- 
latical England  or  Ireland.     Scotland  has  been  for  a 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  173 

long  while  under  the  sway  of  Presbyterianism.  Eng- 
land and  Ireland  (Presbyterian  Ulster  excepted)  under 
that  of  Prelacy.  We  are  wilUng  that  any  enlightened 
and  impartial  mind  shall  decide,  from  the  actual  fruits 
of  the  two  systems  as  developed  in  the  relative  intel- 
ligence, virtue,  industry,  thrift,  and  substantial  com- 
fort of  the  three  nations,  which  system  carries  with  it 
the  strongest  attestation  of  the  Divine  blessing.  The 
question  cannot  be  pursued  into  its  details  here,  bat 
there  is  a  late  Parliamentary  testimony  to  the  benign 
and  powerful  influence  of  the  Church  of  Scotland 
upon  that  country,  which  deserves  to  be  quoted. 
The  Parliamentary  Committee  on  Church  Patronage, 
in  1834,  on  reporting  the  result  of  their  labours  to  the 
legislature,  remark:  "  No  sentiment  has  been  so  deep- 
ly impressed  on  the  mind  of  your  committee,  in  the 
course,  of  their  long  and  laborious  investigation,  as 
that  of  veneration  and  respect  for  the  established 
Church  of  Scotland.  They  believe  that  no  institution 
has  ever  existed,  which  at  so  little  cost  has  accom- 
plished so  much  good.  The  eminent  place  which 
Scotland  holds  in  the  scale  of  nations,  is  mainly  owing 
to  the  purity  of  the  standards,  and  the  zeal  of  the 
ministers  of  the  Church,  as  well  as  the  wisdom  with 
which  its  internal  institutions  have  been  adapted  to 
the  habits  and  interests  of  the  people.'^ 

Again,  we  may  test  the  practical  working  of  the 
Prelatical  system  by  appealing  to  Switzerland.  A 
part  of  the  Swiss  Cantons  are  Romish,  and  a  part 
Protestant.  The  first  enjoy,  of  course,  the  labours  of 
an  "  Apostolic  ministry,"  and  the  potent  and  salutary 
influence  of  a  branch  of  the  true  Church;  while  the 
last  are  without  a  Church  or  a  valid  ministry.  Then, 
certainly,  the  Papal  Cantons  must  be  in  a  far  better 

15* 


174  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

condition  in  all  respects  than  those  occupied  by  Protes- 
tant "sectaries."  So,  on  High-Church  principles,  they 
ought  to  be;  but  so,  unhappily  for  the  theory,  they 
are  not.  On  the  contrary,  it  is  a  common  observation 
of  well-informed  travellers,  that  the  transition  from 
the  Protestant  to  the  Popish  Cantons,  though  separa- 
ted only  by  imaginary  lines,  is  marked  by  a  palpable 
deterioration  in  the  aspect  of  the  farms  and  the  gene- 
ral state  and  character  of  the  inhabitants. — Look,  too, 
at  Italy,  Spain,  Austria,  Sardinia,  Greece,  Armenian 
Turkey,  Syria,  South  America,  and  compare  them 
with  Scotland  and  the  United  States.  All  the  former 
countries  profess  to  have  the  Prelatical  succession, 
and  valid  ordinances;  the  last  two  are,  excepting  as 
to  a  small  fraction  of  their  population,  without  a 
Church  or  authorized  ministry.  To  ask  which  way 
the  scale  preponderates  here,  would  be  to  trifle  with 
men's  reason.  That  the  present  condition  of  these 
countries  has  been  brought  about  by  a  variety  of 
agencies  of  which  religion  is  only  one,  is  readily 
admitted.  Still  it  might  be  supposed  that  even  under 
very  adverse  circumstances,  a  true  Church  would  in 
the  course  of  several  centuries  be  able  to  demonstrate 
its  "Apostolical"  origin  and  character  by  evidences 
quite  as  decisive  as  any  that  could  be  produced  by 
mere  "  schismatical  organizations."  It  will  take  im- 
partial men  who  are  committed  to  no  ecclesiastical 
theory,  some  time  to  believe  that  Spain  and  Italy  and 
the  other  states  named  with  them,  have  an  Apostoli- 
cal ministry,  and  are  sharers  in  God's  covenanted 
blessings,  while  Scotland  and  New  England  are  with- 
out a  Church,  and  have  no  part  nor  lot  in  the  Gospel- 
covenant. 

Perhaps,  however,  this  argument  may  be  met  with 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  175 

the  declaration,  that  both  the  Latin  and  Greek  Church- 
es have  become  so  corrupt  that  it  is  unfair  to  appeaJ 
to  them.  This  explanation  will  only  prejudice  the 
cause  it  is  designed  to  aid.  The  inquiry  is,  whether 
the  High-Church  doctrine  of  the  Prelatical  Succession 
is  sustained  by  its  actual  fruits.  To  say  that  the 
Romish  and  Oriental  Churches,  which  are  alleged  to 
have  this  succession,  "  have  become  corrupt,"  in  the 
first  place,  comes  with  an  ill  grace  from  those  who 
still  recognize  them  as  sister-churches,  while  denying 
the  church-character  of  the  Protestant  bodies;  and, 
in  the  second  place,  involves  a  concession  of  the  point 
at  issue.  We  take  the  fact  thus  admitted  and  point 
to  it  as  conclusive  evidence  of  the  inadequacy  of  the 
alleged  succession  to  preserve  a  Church  from  the 
grossest  defection  both  in  doctrine  and  morals.  Nor 
do  we  stop  here.  We  point,  in  refutation  of  the  no- 
tion that  an  unbroken  Prelatical  Succession  is  the 
unfailing  mark  of  a  true  Church,  to  churches  whose 
claim  to  this  succession  was  far  better  than  that  of 
any  Church  now  is,  and  which  have  become  hereti- 
cal. "The  Avian  Churches  which  once  predomina- 
ted in  the  kingdoms  of  the  Ostrogoths,  the  Visigoths, 
the  Burgundians,  the  Vandals,  and  the  Lombards, 
were  all  Episcopal  churches,  and  all  had  a  fairer 
claim  than  that  of  England  to  the  Apostolical  Suc- 
cession, as  being  much  nearer  to  the  Apostolical  times. 
In  the  East,  the  Greek  Church,  which  is  at  variance 
on  points  of  faith  with  all  the  Western  Churches, 
has  an  equal  claim  to  this  succession.  The  Nestor- 
ian,  the  Eutychian,  the  Jacobite  Churches;  all  liereti- 
cal,  all  condemned  by  councils  of  which  even  Pro- 
testant divines  have  generally  spoken  with  respect, 
had  an  equal  claim  to  the   Apostolical   Succession. 


176  THE    HIGH-CHURCII    DOCTRINE    OF 

Now,  if,  of  teachers  having  Apostolical  orders  a  vast 
majority  have  taught  much  error, — if  a  large  propor- 
tion have  taught  deadly  heresy, — if,  on  the  other 
hand,  churches  not  having  Apostolical  orders — that  of 
Scotland,  for  example — have  been  nearer  to  the  stand- 
ard of  orthodoxy  than  the  majority  of  teachers  who 
have  had  Apostolical  orders — how  can  we  possibly 
be  called  upon  to  submit  our  private  judgment  to  the 
authority  of  a  Church,  on  the  ground  that  she  has 
these  orders?'^!  How  can  the  alleged  possession 
of  these  orders  establish  the  claim  of  a  Church  to  be 
a  true  Church  of  Christ  ? 

Take  another  class  of  facts.  The  Bishops  in  the 
line  of  the  succession,  are,  we  are  told,  the  only  suc- 
cessors of  the  Apostles.  They  are  the  authorized 
governors  of  the  Church.  To  them  alone  is  entrusted 
"the  gift  of  the  Holy  Ghost."  They  are  the  guar- 
dians of  the  truth  and  the  only  channel  through  which 
God  bestows  grace  upon  mankind.  Or,  to  state  the 
doctrine  in  the  language  of  a  High-Church  Bishop, 
"  The  Episcopacy  is  her  [the  Church's]  living  bond  of 
union  with  Christ;  the  channel  in  which  the  grace 
has  been  transmitted  through  the  hands  of  the  Apos- 
tles, which  lends  her  virtue  to  her  sacraments,  and 
gives  to  penitent  and  faithful  hearts  assurance  of  ac- 
ceptance and  salvation  through  the  purchase  of  the 
blessed  cross:  apart  from  which,  it  could  have  no 
connection  with  the  Apostles,  and  could  claim  no 
promise  made  to  them."^ — Such  is  the  theory.  Now 
lay  along  side  of  it  the  historical  fact,  that  individuals 
among   these   very  Bishops   have   been    the    chief 

AUTHORS    AND    ABETTORS    OF    THE    HERESIES,  SCHISMS, 

1  Macaulay's  Review  of  Gladstone,  p.  303, 

2  Bishop  Doane's  Elizabethtown  Sermon,  p.  22» 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  177 

AND  IMMORALITIES  which  have  defiled  and  distracted 
the  Church  from  the  days  of  the  Apostles  to  the  pre- 
sent time.  Not  only  so,  but  whenever  sound  doctrine 
and  Evangelical  religion  have  been  revived,  it  has 
usually  been  done  not  by  these  Bishops,  but  in  the 
face  of  their  systematic  and  bitter  opposition.  The 
Waldenses  in  the  vallies  of  the  Alps,  the  Lollards  in 
England,  Luther,  Melancthon,  Calvin,  Zuingle,  and 
Knox;  the  Puritans  in  their  day;  and  the  Wesleys 
and  Whitfield  in  still  later  times,  are  all  witnesses  to 
this  fact.  Even  in  England,  although  the  Reforma- 
tion derived  most  effective  aid  from  Cranmer,  Lati- 
mer, Ridley,  Plooper,  Jewell,  and  others  —  Bishops 
worthy  of  the  name,  "  who  counted  not  their  lives 
dear  unto  them  for  the  sake  of  the  Lord  Jesus" — yet, 
before  the  quarrel  between  Henry  VIII.  and  the 
Pope,  the  Bishops  generally  were  the  determined 
enemies  of  all  reformation,  and  persecuted  and  put 
to  death  those  who  attempted  it,  as  they  did  the  Non- 
conformists and  Covenanters  many  years  afterwards. 
"  The  Gospel,"  says  Mr.  Powell  emphatically,  in  ad- 
verting to  these  facts,  "  would  have  perished  if  left 
to  this  succession." 

The  corrupt  state  of  the  Church  of  England  during 
the  greater  part  of  the  last  century,  is  familiar  to 
every  reader  of  history.  The  London  "  Christian 
Observer"  says  of  its  own  Church,  "  If  we  advert  to 
the  days  of  Whitfield  and  Wesley,  we  shall  find  that 
the  great  charge  against  those  "  enthusiasts,"  as  they 
were  called,  was  that  they  preached  justification  by 
faith  instead  of  works ;  the  majority  of  the  clergy 
denouncing  the  doctrine  of  justification  by  faith  as 
hostile  to  the  interests  of  morality.  In  this  shape,  the 
dispute  came  down  to  the  present  century.  Our  clergy 


178  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

had  nearly  lost  sight  of  the  true  Protestant  scriptural 
doctrine.  .  .  The  practice  was  not  then  common  of 
using  the  language  of  Scripture  and  our  own  Articles, 
but  of  appropriating  the  justification  predicated  in 
them  to  baptism.  The  clergy  very  generally  dis- 
claimed  altogether  the  doctrine  of  justification  by 
faith,  and  earnestly  exhorted  men  to  justify  them- 
selves by  good  living.  They  in  fact  adopted  the 
Papists'  second  justification,  losing  sight  of  the  first."  ^ 
Toplady,  an  eminent  divine  of  that  church  gives  this 
picture  of  its  condition  in  his  day — ^just  before  the 
American  Revolution. ^  "  Where  shall  we  stop?  We 
have  already  forsook  the  good  old  paths  trod  by  Christ 
and  the  Apostles;  paths  in  which  our  Reformers  also 
trod,  our  martyrs,  our  Bishops,  our  universities,  and 
the  whole  of  this  Protestant,  i.  e.  of  this  once  Calvin- 
istic,  nation.  Our  Liturgy,  our  Articles  and  our  Ho- 
milies, it  is  true,  still  keep  possession  of  our  Church 
walls :  but  we  pray,  "we  subscribe,  we  assent  one 
way:  we  believe,  we  preach,  we  Avrite  another.  In 
the  desk,  we  are  verbal  Calvinists;  but  no  sooner  do 
we  ascend  a  few  steps  above  the  desk,  [into  the 
pulpit]  than  we  forget  the  grave  character  in  which 
we  appeared  below,  and  tag  the  performance  with  a 
few  minutes'  entertainment  compiled  from  the  frag- 
ments bequeathed  to  us  by  Pelagius  and  Arminius ; 
not  to  say  Arius,  Socinus,  and  others  still  worse 
than  they.  Observe,  I  speak  not  of  all  indiscrimi- 
nately. We  have  many  great  and  good  men,  some  of 
whom  are,  and  some  of  whom  are  not,  Calvinists. 
But  that  the  glory  is,  in  a  very  considerable  degree, 
departed  from  our  established  Sion,  is  a  truth  which 

•  Vol.  xxxviii.  p.  496. — Cited  in  "Oxford  Divinity." 
2  Works,  8vo.  ed.  p.  275.     Ibid.    . 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  179 

cannot  be  contravened,  a  fact  which  must  be  lamented, 
and  an  alarming  symptom  which  ought  to  be  pub- 
licly noticed.''  He  then  quotes  an  observation  of 
Dr.  Young's,  that  "almost  every  cottage  can  show 
us  one  that  has  corrupted,  and  every  palace  one  that 
has  renounced  the  faith;"  and  asks  this  emphatic 
question,  "  Is  there  a  single  heresy,  that  ever  an- 
noyed the  Christian  world,  which  has  .not  its  pre- 
sent partisans  among  those  who  profess  conformity 
to  the  Church  of  England ?"i  This  general  corrup- 
tion of  doctrine  in  the  Establishment,  was,  as  might 
be  expected,  accompanied  by  a  corresponding  defec- 
tion of  life  and  manners  among  the  clergy  and  laity. 
These  evils  were  propagated  from  the  mother  country 
to  the  colonies.  The  great  body  of  the  Episcopal 
ministers  in  Virginia,  for  example,  were  men  of 
notoriously  bad  character — a  disgrace  to  the  Church 
and  to  religion.     At  length,  there  were  cheering  indi- 

1  During  this  period  there  were  frequent  debates  in  Parliament  on 
the  subject  of  repealing  some  of  the  oppressive  laws  against  Dis- 
senters. On  one  of  these  occasions,  in  the  year  1773,  the  illustrious 
Earl  of  Chatham,  in  vindicating  the  Dissenters  from  the  violent 
attacks  of  several  of  the  Bishops,  and  especially  of  the  Archbishop  of 
York,  who  had  charged  them  with  being  "  men  of  close  ambition," 
made  use  of  this  memorable  language.  "  The  dissenting  ministers 
are  represented  as  '  men  of  close  ambition.'  They  are  so,  my  lords  : 
and  their  ambition  is  to  keep  close  to  the  college  of  fishermen,  not 
of  cardinals;  and  to  the  doctrine  of  inspired  Apostles,  not  to  the 
decrees  of  interested  and  aspiring  Bishops.  They  contend  for  a 
spiritual  creed  and  spiritual  worship;  we  have  a  Calcinistic  creed,  a 
Popish  liturgy,  and  an  Arminian  clergy.  The  Reformation  has  laid 
open  the  Scriptures  to  all;  let  not  the  Bishops  shut  them  again.  Laws 
in  support  of  ecclesiastical  power  are  pleaded  which  it  would  shock 
humanity  to  execute.  It  is  said  that  religious  sects  have  done  great 
mischief  when  they  were  not  kept  under  restraint;  but  history  affords 
no  proof  that  sects  have  ever  been  mischievous  when  they  were  not 
oppressed  and  persecuted  by  the  ruling  church," 


ISO  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

cations  of  a  revival  of  true  piety  in  the  Establishment, 
which  ultimately  resulted  in  its  partial  renovation. 
Here,  again,  however,  the  "  Successors  of  the  Apos- 
tles" who  have  the  special  oversight  of  Christ's  flock, 
instead  of  reformhig  the  Church,  waited  to  be  reform- 
ed by  it.  While  they  were  sleeping  at  their  posts, 
or  spending  their  time  in  luxurious  indolence,  Grim- 
shaw,  Romaine,  Samuel  Walker,  Hervey,  Venn, 
Newton,  Scott,  Milner,  Wilberforce,  Hannah  More, 
and  others  of  a  like  spirit,  came  forward  in  the  pulpit, 
or  through  the  press,  to  roll  back  the  torrent  of  error 
and  secularity  which  had  deluged  the  Church,  and  to 
unfurl  the  banner  of  evangelical  religion.  Not  a 
solitary  Prelate  appears  among  the  original  leaders  in 
this  movement;  nor  did  any  of  them  give  it  their 
decided  countenance  until  after  it  had  made  very  con- 
siderable progress. 

Facts  like  these — and  ecclesiastical  history  abounds 
with  them — require  some  solution  from  those  who 
maintain  the  doctrine  of  an  unbroken  Prelatical  Suc- 
cession as  essential  to  a  true  Church.  How  comes 
it  to  pass,  if  this  doctrine  be  scriptural,  that  in  nearly 
all  cases,  Bishops  in  the  line  of  this  pretended  succes- 
sion have  been  the  principal  corrupters  of  the  Church; 
and  that  when  the  reformation  of  a  Church  was  to  be 
effected,  the  inferior  clergy  or  the  laity  have  been 
obliged  to  do  it  without  their  sanction,  and,  in  most 
cases,  in  defiance  of  their  opposition  ?  If  the  High- 
Church  theory  be  true,  there  is  certainly  an  apparent 
repugnance  between  the  charter  God  has  given  his. 
Church  and  his  jwovideiitial  dealings  with  her,  which 
it  will  require  more  than  ordinary  sagacity  to  explain. 

Again,  how  is  this  theory  to  be  harmonized  with 
innumerable  facts  in  the  origin  and  progress  of  non- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  181 

Prelatical  Churches?  Our  own  country,  for  exam- 
ple, had  but  a  very  limited  number  of  Prelatical 
Churches  and  ministers  prior  to  the  Revolution,  and 
the  proportion  is  to  this  day  very  small  as  compared 
with  the  aggregate  of  the  non-Episcopal  denomina- 
tions: yet  it  is  generally  thought  that  the  influence 
of  true  religion  has  been  widely  and  effectively  dif- 
fused among  our  population,  especially  in  the  older 
States.  Is  nine-tenths  of  this  religion  mere  fanaticism 
or  is  it  genuine  piety  ?  And  if  the  latter,  how  comes 
it  to  pass  that  such  fruit  and  in  such  profusion  should 
be  found  in  a  country  so  nearly  destitute  for  a  long 
time  and  as  to  a  large  portion  of  its  population,  of  a 
Church  and  ministry? 

Or,  look  at  the  hundreds,  not  to  say  thousands,  of 
non-Prelatical  congregations  throughout  the  Union 
now;  and  explain,  if  it  be  possible,  on  High-Church 
principles,  the  phenomena  connected  with  their  "schis- 
matical"  ordinances.  How  happens  it,  if  these  prin- 
ciples are  sound,  that  "unauthorized'^  ministers  have 
in  so  many  instances  been  instrumental  in  renovating 
nat  merely  congregations  but  communities — that  God 
has  made  their  labours  effectual  in  the  conversion 
and  sanctification  of  multitudes  who  from  having 
been  gay,  careless,  and  perhaps  profligate  persons, 
have  been  transformed  into  meek  and  faithful  follow- 
ers of  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ?  And,  again,  how  is  it 
that  the  same  kind  of  ministrations  has  produced  the 
same  results,  even  in  Pagan  lands, — that  preachers 
sent  out  with  "no  commissions,"  or  only  "forged com- 
missions" from  these  no-church  organizations,  have 
in  repeated  instances  been  owned  of  God  as  the  chief 
agents  in  subverting  colossal  systems  of  idolatry  and 
bringing  heathen  tribes  to  the  faith  and  obedience  of 


182  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

the  Gospel?  High-Churchmen  talk  much  about  the 
"validity'^  and  "invahdity''  of  ordinances.  Let 
them  show,  if  they  can,  that  "valid"  ordinances  have 
ever,  since  the  days  of  miracles,  wrought  greater  won- 
ders than  these ;  or  if  they  cannot  do  this,  let  them 
candidly  confess  that  ordinances  which  lead  to  such 
results,  have  a  divine  attestation  to  their  "  validity" 
which  no  man  may  lawfully  gainsay. 

On  the  whole,  the  further  this  collation  of  facts  is 
carried,  the  more  evident  will  it  be  that  the  High- 
Church  theory  of  an  unbroken  Prelatical  Succession 
as  essential  to  the  Church,  can  no  more  bear  the  ap- 
plication of  this  test,  than  it  can  to  be  tried  by  Scripture 
or  History. 


CHAPTER  VI. 


the  true  succession. 


The  High-Church  theory  of  the  Apostolical  Succes- 
sion has  now  been  tested  by  Scripture,  by  history, 
and  by  facts.  The  confidence  with  which  its  claims 
are  urged,  seems  to  demand  that  the  difference  be- 
tween this  theory  and  the  true  doctrine  of  suc- 
cession, should  be  more  distinctly  pointed  out  before 
we  leave  this  branch  of  the  subject. 

The  theory  I  am  examining  proceeds  upon  the  two- 
fold assumption,  that  the  Church  is  to  be  perpetuated 
only  through  an  uninterrupted  personal  succession  of 
ministers,  and  that  these  ministers  must  be  of  Prelati- 
cal rank.  This  succession  of  persons  is  made  not 
merely  an  essential,  but  the  leading  mark  of  a  true 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  183 

Church.  Not  only  does  it  take  precedence  of  truth 
of  doctrine,  in  the  writings  of  this  school,  but  by  many 
of  them,  truth  of  doctrine  is  not  admitted  to  be  an  in- 
dispensible  note  of  a  true  Church.  ^  The  Church,  the 
ministry,  the  sacraments,  the  gifts  of  salvation,  are  all 
tied  to  this  personal  succession. 

It  has  been  shown  that  this  scheme  derives  very 
little  countenance  from  the  New  Testament — a  point 
candidly  conceded  by  the  leading  Puseyites.  Those 
who  attempt  to  deduce  it  from  the  Apostolic  commis- 
sion, are  obliged  to  assume,  (1.)  That  the  terms  of 
that  commission  imply  the  perpetuity  of  the  Apostolic 
office.  (2.)  That  the  office  was  to  be  handed  down 
from  one  generation  of  Apostles  to  another,  through 
an  unbroken  series  of  ordinations.  (3.)  That  no  ordi- 
nations would  be  valid,  excepting  those  performed  by 
Apostles  or  Prelates.  (4.)  That  the  promise  annexed 
to  the  commission  was  designed  only  for  the  ministers 
who  might  be  in  the  line  of  this  succession.  And,  (5.) 
That  all  who  were  in  this  line  would  be  entitled  to 
the  promise,  whether  they  fulfilled  the  condition  on 
which  it  is  suspended,  that  is,  whether  they  "  preached 
the  Gospel,"  or  not.  Every  one  of  these  positions  is 
denied.  They  have  been  rejected  by  the  great  mass 
of  the  Protestant  world,  as  they  were  by  the  Reform- 
ers both  in  England  and  on  the  Continent.  They 
are  not,  then,  to  be  taken  for  granted;  they  must  be 
proved.  And  there  is  one  short  method  of  testing  the 
interpretation  on  which  they  rest.  The  Saviour's 
promises  are  sure.  If  the  promise,  "  Lo,  I  am  with 
you  always,"  was  designed  only  for  Prelates,  and 
ministers  ordained  by  Prelates,  facts  will  show  it. 
Is  it,  then,  a  fact  that  he  has  given  his  presence  and 

'  See  Palmer  on  the  Church,  I.  46. 


1S4  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

blessing  only  to  the  ministers  in  this  pretended  succes- 
sion ?i  Will  any  man  venture  to  say  that  Christ's 
blessing  was  bestowed  upon  thfe  sensual  and  simoni- 
acal  Bishops  and  Popes  of  the  middle  ages,  who  are 
claimed  to  belong  to  this  Succession,  and  withheld 
from  such  men  as  the  Erskines,  and  Owen,  and  Bax- 
ter, and  Edwards,  and  Davies?  If  not,  what  becomes 
of  the  interpretation  that  would  restrict  this  promise 
to  the  Prelatical  Succession  ? 

The  perpetuity  of  the  ministry  is  taught  both  in  this 
commission  and  in  numerous  other  passages  in  the 
New  Testament.  But  it  is  not  said  that  the  ministry 
should  be  divided  into  different  ranks,  or  that  the 
right"  of  ordination  should  be  vested  in  one  rank  to 
the  exclusion  of  another,  or  that  there  should  be  an 
indefectible  personal  succession  of  ministers  to  the 
end  of  time,  or  that  the  Holy  Ghost  should  be  trans- 
mitted along  this  pretended  chain.  If  such  a  succes- 
sion were  essential  to  personal  union  with  Christ  or 
to  a  true  Church,  that  is,  if  it  occupied  the  place  in 
real  Christianity  which  it  does  in  the  High-Church 
scheme,  the  New  Testament  would  not  have  taught 
it  in  a  way  which  has  compelled  the  warmest  advo- 
cates of  the  dogma  to  say  that  if  it  is  in  the  Bible  at 
all,  it  can  be  derived  from  it  "  only  by  the  aid  of  very 
attenuated  and  nicely  managed  inferential  argu- 
ments." Under  the  Levitical  economy,  personal  suc- 
cession was  an  indispensable  condition  of  the  priest- 
hood. This  is  not  merely  hinted  at,  but  laid  down 
with  the  utmost  explicitness  and  solemnity.  The 
principle  is  interlaced  with  the  whole  complicated 
jQwish  ritual.  Numerous  laws  were  enacted  for  the 
purpose  of  insuring  and  protecting  the   succession. 

•  See  Chap.  V. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  185 

And  instead  of  leaving  it  to  be  authenticated  by  such 
miscellaneous  writers  as  might  happen  to  take  an  in- 
terest in  the  suh}ect, genealogical  tables  were  required 
to  be  kept  with  sacred  fidelity,  as  the  official  and  con- 
clusive evidence  of  the  genuineness  of  the  succession. 
The  moment  the  Christian  dispensation  opens,  all 
this  apparatus  vanishes.  We  hear  of  a  ministry,  it 
is  true — a  permanent  ministry — but  nothing  of  regis- 
ters of  Bishops — nothing  of  the  divine  mercy  being 
restricted  to  a  single  channel  of  communication  with 
our  world — nothing  of  the  Church  and  salvation  being 
suspended  upon  an  unbroken  series  of  ordinations. 
The  fact  that  ordinations  were  performed  only  by 
those  who  had  themselves  been  clothed  with  office — 
whether  Apostles  or  Presbyters — is  of  great  import- 
ance and  authority,  as  showing  that  the  right  of  ordi- 
nation is  vested  in  the  ministry,  and  that  individuals 
are  not  to  exercise  the  functions  of  this  office  without 
being  duly  set  apart  to  it.  But  it  is  going  quite  be- 
yond the  legitimate  import  of  this  fact,  to  infer  from 
it  that  an  uninterrupted  succession  from  the  Apostles 
is  the  s{7ie  qua  non  of  a  valid  ministry.  This  would 
be  to  place  the  Christian  ministry  on  the  same  footing 
with  the  Levitical  priesthood.  And  if  this  had  been 
the  design  of  the  Saviour — if  he  had  intended  to  in- 
corporate in  the  constitution  of  the  New  Testament 
Church  the  principle  of  a  personal  succession  as  in- 
dispensable to  the  Church  and  to  the  communication 
of  spiritual  blessings — it  is  inconceivable  that  all  the 
arrangements  of  the  old  dispensation  for  preserving 
and  verifying  the  succession  would  have  been  omit- 
ted in  the  new.  The  absence  of  any  such  provisions 
in  the  New  Testament,  and,  as  a  consequence  of  it, 
the  want  of  any  genealogical  records  of  the  succession 

16* 


186  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

Avhich  can  bear  the  scrutiny  of  history,  leave  it  utterly 
uncertain,  on  the  theory  under  consideration,  whether 
there  is  now  a  true  Church  upan  earth.  The  con- 
tinued existence  of  the  ministry  as  an  order  of  men 
from  the  Apostles'  days  to  our  own,  is  a  historical 
fact  which  no  sane  man  would  question.  But  the 
fact  is  equally  indisputable  that  no  Uving  minister  can 
trace  up  his  own  descent  with  absolute  certainty  to 
the  Apostles,  through  an  unbroken  series  of  regular 
ordinations. 

Again,  every  attentive  reader  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment must  have  observed,  that  while  it  says  very  little 
about  the  succession  of  ministers,  it  says  a  great  deal 
about  their  character  and  doctrine.  It  is  impossible 
to  harmonize  the  language  it  employs  respecting yi//*e 
teachers,  with  a  theory  which  makes  personal  succes- 
sion of  more  importance  in  the  ministry  than  sound 
doctrine.  "  Beloved,  believe  not  every  spirit,  but  try 
the  spirits  whether  they  are  of  God;  because  many 
false  prophets  are  gone  out  into  the  world."  "  If 
there  come  any  unto  you  and  bring  not  this  doctrine, 
receive  him  not  into  your  house."  "  Beware  of  false 
prophets  which  come  to  you  in  sheep's  clothing,  but 
inwardly  they  are  ravening  wolves.  Ye  shall  know 
them  by  their  fruits."  "  False  prophets,"  says  Gro- 
tius,  "not  as  to  their  mission  or  calling,  but  as  to 
their  false,  destructive  doctrine.^''  The  Apostle  Paul 
speaks  of  certain  teachers  in  the  Corinthian  Churches, 
as  "  false  Apostles,  deceitful  workers,  transforming 
themselves  into  the  Apostles  of  Christ."  These  he 
pronounces  "  ministers  of  Satan,"  and  that,  not  be- 
cause they  were  not  in  the  true  "succession,"  but 
because  they  "corrupted  the  word  of  God,"  and 
"handled"  it  "deceitfully."     And  he  bids  Timothy, 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  lS7 

and,  in  similar  terms,  the  Thessalonian  Christians,  to 
withdraw  from  those  Avhose  teachings  were  contrary 
to  "  the  words  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  and  to  the 
doctrine  which  is  according  to  godhness."  The  New 
Testament  abounds  with  warnings  of  this  kind.  In 
no  one  instance  are  Christians  directed  to  prove  a 
rehgious  teacher  by  his  ecclesiastical  pedigree,  but 
uniformly  by  his  doctrine.  These  instructions,  too, 
are  addressed  to  the  people.  In  the  exercise  of  that 
right  oi  private  judgment  of  which  Romanists  and 
High-Churchmen  stand  so  much  in  dread,  they  are  to 
bring  every  minister's  doctrines,  as  the  Bereans  did 
Paul's,  "to  the  law  and  the  testimony;"  and  those 
whose  doctrines  cannot  pass  this  ordeal,  are  to  be 
rejected,  although  their  credentials  certify  that  they 
are  lineally  descended  from  the  first  Apostles.  It  was 
with  reason  that  the  Apostles  insisted  so  much  upon 
sound  doctrine,  and  so  little  upon  mere  succession. 
One  of  their  fellow-apostles  had  proved  a  traitor. 
Among  their  followers  were  a  Demas,  a  Diotrophes, 
a  Hymeneus,  and  a  Philetus.  Not  only  were  false 
teachers  entering  the  Church  from  without,  but  they 
foresaw  and  distinctly  predicted  a  terrible  apostacy'^ 
in  the. Church  which  was  to  be  widely  extended  and 
to  continue  for  a  long  time.  They  might  be  certain, 
therefore,  from  what  had  happened,  and  from  what 
they  saw  was  to  happen,  that  the  ministry,  a  large 
portion  of  it  at  least,  would  become  corrupt,  and 
would  diffuse  and  perpetuate  its  corruptions  by  intro- 
ducing errorists  and  profligates  into  the  sacred  office. 
It  would  have  been  surprising  if,  in  these  circumstan- 
ces, they  had  not  made  apostolicity  of  doctrine,  not 

'  See  2  Thessalonians  ii. 


188  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

apostolicity  as  to  mere  successionj  the  main  test  of  a 
lawful  ministry. 

It  is,  indeed,  a  fatal  objection  to  the  High-Church 
theory,  that  it  makes  a  mere  matter  of  order  para- 
momit  in  importance  to  truth  and  holiness.  The 
primary  question  it  asks  respecting  a  Christian  minis- 
ter is  not,  "What  is  his  doctrine?''  or  "What  are  his 
morals?"  but,  "What  is  his  genealogy?"  It  seems 
to  be  taken  for  granted,  because  the  ministry  is  to  be 
a  permanent  institution,  and  the  injunction  has  been 
left  on  record,  "  The  same  commit  thou  to  faithful 
men  who  shall  be  able  to  teach  others  also,"  with  the 
promise,  "Lo,  I  am  with  you  always,"  that  this  duty 
is  complied  with  and  the  fulfilment  of  this  promise 
secured,  whenever  an  individual  is  regularly  ordain- 
ed. But  this  is  to  overlook  the  obvious  import  of 
these  passages.  Ordination  is  not  the  only,  nor  even 
the  chief  point  they  involve.  "  Lo,  I  am  with  yow." 
With  whom?  The  first  words  of  the  commission 
furnish  the  answer:  "  Go,  preach  my  Gospel."  He 
is  with  those  who  preach  his  Gospel. — "  The  things 
that  thou  hast  heard  of  me  among  many  witnesses, 
the  same  commit  thou  to  faithful  men  who  shall  be 
able  to  teach  others  also."  What  are  "  the  things" 
here  intended?  Unquestionably,  the  great  truths' of 
the  Gospel.  And  to  whom  are  they  to  be  "  commit- 
ted?" To  "faithful  men." — Now  are  passages 
like  these  to  be  brought  forward  as  "proof-texts"  in 
support  of  the  dogma  that  any  and  every  man  upon 
whom  the  hands  of  a  Bishop  have  been  laid,  is  in  the 
genuine  line  of  succession  from  the  Apostles  ?  If  a 
man  preaches  that  we  are  not  justified  solely  by  faith 
in  Christ — that  our  own  works  constitute  in  part  the 
meritorious  ground  of  our  acceptance  with  God — that 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  189 

Christ  is  offered  up  afresh  as  a  sacrifice,  every  time 
the  Lord's  Supper  is  celebrated — that  baptism  is  the 
chief  instrument  of  regeneration — that  prayer  is  to 
be  offered  to  the  angels  and  departed  saints, — is  that 
man  to  be  regarded  as  '''preaching  the  Gospel  7"^^ 
Can  he  claim  the  promise,  "  Lo,  I  am  with  you  ?" 
Or  if  a  Bishop  gives  himself  up  to  a  life  of  debauch- 
ery— trafiicks  in  "  Uvings" — confers  orders  for  gain — 
and  scatters  and  devours  the  flock  he  was  appointed 
to  feed, — is  he  to  be  owned  as  a  '^faithfuP^  man,  and 
reverenced  as  a  successor  of  the  Apostles?  Paul 
himself  did  not  think  so,  whatever  some  among  his 
"  successors"  may  think.  "  Though  Ave,  or  an  an- 
gel from  heaven,''^  he  says,  '^ preach  any  other' gos- 
pel unto  you  than  that  which  we  have  preached  unto 
you,  let  him  be  accursed.^^  The  anathema  which  he 
invoked,  was  upon  those  who  "  preach  another  gos- 
pel." The  malediction  of  our  modern  "Apostles" 
lights  upon  those  who  preach  the  same  gospel  that 
Paul  preached,  but  who,  like  Timothy,  have  been 
ordained  only  "  by  the  laying  on  of  the  hands  of 
the  Presbytery."  According  to  Paul's  canon,  no 
form  of  ordination,  no  Apostolic  lineage,  not  even 
angelic  rank  and  powers,  could  legitimate  his  com- 
mission who  preached  a  false  Gospel.  According 
to  theirs,  no  orderly  investiture  with  the  sacred  office 
by  "faithful"  ministers,  no  truth  of  doctrine,  no  holi- 
ness of  life,  no  fidehty  in  winning  souls  to  Christ,  can 
make  him  other  than  a  "  follower  of  Korah,  Dathan, 
and  Abiram,"  over  whom  a  Bishop  has  not  pro- 
nounced the  awful  words,  "Receive  the  Holy  Ghost." 
They,  with  their  predilection  for  a  ritual  religion,  can 
see  nothing  in  the  Apostolic  commission  but  the 
pledge  of  an  unbroken  series  of  robed  and  mitred 


190  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

Prelates  extending  from  the  Apostles  down  to  the  end 
of  all  things.  He,  though  never  the  patron  or  apolo- 
gist of  disorder  in  the  government  or  worship  of  the 
Church,  contemplates  the  possihility  of  a  divorce  be- 
tween truth  and  order,  and  directs  that  m  every  such 
case  order  shall  yield  to  truth.  They  would  sacrifice 
the  gem  to  save  the  casket ;  he,  the  casket  to  save  the 
gem. — And  this  leads  me  to  mention  as  another  objec- 
tion to  the  High-Church  theory,  that  it  reverses  the 
true  position  of  the  Church  and  the  ministry.  The 
argument  runs  thus:  the  ministry  has  been  preserved 
until  the  present  time,  therefore  there  is  a  true  Church 
in  the  world.  Whereas  it  should  run  thus:  the  true 
Church  has  been  preserved,  therefore  there  is  a  valid 
ministry  in  existence.  On  the  former  view,  the 
Church  is  an  appendage  of  the  ministry;  on  the  latter, 
the  ministry  belongs  to  the  Church.  Some  of  the 
Oxford  writers  have  boldly  taken  the  Romanist 
ground  that  the  clergy  are  the  Church:  and  this 
notion  really  pervades  the  whole  High-Church  sys- 
tem, although  it  is  not  common  to  hear  it  distinctly 
avowed. 

For  the  clearing  of  this  point,  let  it  be  noted  that 
the  materials  of  which  the  first  churches  were  com- 
posed, were  in  being  before  the  ordinary  ministry. 
The  Apostles  were  sent  forth  as  extraordinary  ofH- 
cers  to  bring  men  to  the  knowledge  of  Christ,  and 
then  they  were  organized  into  societies  under  perma- 
nent officers.  There  were  Christians  first;  then  Min- 
isters  to  watch  over  and  instruct  them.  The  titles  of 
Ministers  imply  tlie  same  thing.  As  a  Minister  "  has 
the  oversight  of  the  flock  of  Christ,  he  is  termed 
Bishop.  As  he  feeds  them  with  spiritual  food,  he  is 
termed  Pastor,     As  he  serves  Christ  in  his  Church, 


THE' APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  191 

he  is  termed  Minister.     As  it  is  his  duty  to  he  grave 
and  prudent,  and  an  example  of  the  flock,  and  to 
govern  well  in  the  house  and  kingdom  of  Christ,  he 
is  termed  Presbyter  or  Elder. ''^'^     All  these  titles  pre- 
suppose a  society  of  Christians  over  whom  he  is  placed 
in  the  Lord,  and /or  whose  benefit  he  is  invested  with 
his  office.     What  is  here  implied,  is  expressly  taught 
in  the   Scriptures.      *' And  he  gave  some,  apostles; 
and  some,  prophets;  and  some,  evangelists;  and  some, 
pastors  and  teachers:  for  the  perfecting  of  the  saints, 
for  the  work  of  the  ministry,  for  the  edifying  of  the 
body  of  Christ,  till  we  all  come  in  the  unity  of  the 
faith  and  of  the  knowledge  of  the  Son  of  God,  unto  a 
perfect  man,  unto  the  measure  of  the  stature  of  the 
fulness   of  Christ."    (Eph.   iv.   11-13.)      The   great 
design  and  business  of  the  ministry  are  here  stated. 
They  are  set  "  for  the  perfecting  of  the  saints,  for  the 
work  of  the  ministry,  for  the  edifying  of  the  body  of 
Christ.^'     The  means  by  which  they  are  to  promote 
these  ends  are  elsewhere  prescribed,  viz.  the  preach- 
ing of  the  word,  the  administration  of  the  sacraments, 
and  the  exercise  of  godly  discipUne.     But  it  is  the 
design  of  their  institution  with  which  we  are  concern- 
ed now.     This,  it  will  be  seen,  has  respect  entirely  to 
the  welfare  and  prosperity  of  Christ's  flock.     They 
are  the  rulers  of  the  flock,  it  is  true,,  but  all  the  power 
they  have  is  ministerial,  and  they  are  to  exercise  it 
for  the  good  of  the  flock,  whose  "servants'^  they  are. 
They  are  to  feed  them  with  knowledge  and  under- 
standing— to  break  to  them  the  bread  of  life — to  warn 
and  defend  them  against  their  adversaries — and  to 
bring  them  back  when  they  wander  from  the  path  of 
life.     In  a  word,  every  thing  pertaining  to  their  office 

1  Form  of  Government  of  Presbyterian  Church,  Chap.  IV. 


192  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

shows  that  they  are  created  for  the  Church,  not  the 
Church  for  them.  Or,  as  the  Westminster  Confession 
of  Faith  expresses  it,  the  ministry  is  '^  given  to  the 
Church:' 

This  being  the  case,  it  is  reversing  the  true  order 
of  things  to  suspend  the  being  of  the  Church  upon  a 
personal  succession  of  ministers.  The  perpetuity  of 
the  Church  is  secured  by  the  covenant-promise  of  her 
Lord;  and  the  ministry  belongs  to  her.  It  is  her 
inalienable  right :  and  wherever  the  Church  is,  this 
right  is. 

"  But,"  it  may  be  said,  "  how  is  the  Church  to  b6 
known,  otherwise  than  by  an  unbroken  succession  in 
the  ministry?"  I  answer,  if  this  were  the  only  mark 
of  a  true  Church,  it  could  not  be  known  at  all:  for  no 
Church  can  prove  that  her  ministry  has  such  a  suc- 
cession. But  this  is  so  far  from  being  regarded  as  the 
chief  note  of  a  true  Church,  that  it  is  not  named  at  all 
in  the  definitions  of  the  Church  given  by  the  Refor- 
mers and  the  Reformed  Churches.  Luther  assigned 
as  notes  of  the  true  Church,  the  true  and  uncorrupted 
preaching  of  the  Gospel,  administration  of  baptism,  of 
the  eucharist,  and  of  the  keys;  a  legitimate  ministry, 
public  service  in  a  known  language,  and  tribulations 
internally  and  externally.  Calvin  recognizes  the  usual 
distinction  between  the  invisible  and  visible  Church  : 
the  former  as  comprehending  all  true  believers  living 
at  any  one  time  upon  earth,  and  those  who  have  gone 
to  their  reward.  Of  the  latter,  the  only  marks  he 
reckons,  are  "  the  pure  preaching  and  hearing  of  the 
word,  and  the  administration  of  the  sacraments  accord- 
ing to  the  institution  of  Christ."  ^  Turrettin,  after 
defining  the  invisible  Church  in  the  usual  way,  makes 

1  Inst.  B,  IV.  ch.  i. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  193 

the  visible  Clinrch  q,  "society  of  men  called  by  the 
preaching  of  the  Gospel  to  tlie  profession  of  one 
faith,  communion  in  the  same  sacraments,  and  union 
under  one  form  of  government."  ^  The  word,  he 
justly  observes,  is  chiefly  used  in  the  New  Testament 
in  the  former  sense,  to  denote  Christ's  true  sheep; 
the  other  is  its  secondary  and  less  proper  sis:nification. 
Pictet's  definitions^  are  very  similar  to  Turrettin's. 
Claude  restricts  the  application  of  the  term  Church  to 
true  believers.  3  Dr.  Jackson,  a  high  authority  at 
Oxford,  says  that  "the  one,  holy.  Catholic  Church, 
ivhich  we  believe  in  the  Creed, ^^  is  the  aggregate  of 
those  who  are  united  to  Christ  by  a  living  faith.  So 
far  is  he  from  confounding  this  Church  with  the 
visible  Church,  that  he  says  the  true  Church  has  at 
some  periods,  "  been  remarkably  visible  in  such  as 
that  visible  (Roman)  Church  did  condemn  for  here- 
tics.'^^  The  French  Protestant  Church,  whose  Arti- 
cles Calvin  assisted  in  framing,  also  makes  the  Church 
"an  assembly  of  believers,"  with  whom  there  are 
"  some  hypocrites  and  ill-livers"  mingled.  Another 
Article  of  this  Confession,  as  bearing  upon  the  ques- 
tion under  discussion,  it  may  be  well  to  quote  in  full. 
Art.  XXXI.  "We  believe  that  it  is  not  lawful  for  any 
man  of  his  own  authority  to  take  upon  himself  the 
government  of  the  Church,  but  that  every  one  ought 
to  be  admitted  thereunto  by  a  lawful  election,  if  it 
may  possibly  be  done,  and  that  the  Lord  do  so  per- 
mit it.  Which  exception  we  have  expressly  added, 
because  that  sometime  (as  it  hath  fallen  out  in  our 

»  De  Ecclesia,  Quaest.  II.  10. 

2  De  Eccl.  Cap.  I.  3. 

3  See  his  "  Defence  of  the  Reformation,"  passim. 

4  Jackson  on  the  Church,  Philad.  ed.  67-9. 

17 


194  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

days)  the  state  of  the  Church  being  interrupted,  God 
hath  raised  up  some  persons  in  an  extraordinary 
manner  to  repair  the  ruins  of  the  decayed  Church. 
But,  let  it  be  what  it  will,  we  believe  that  this  rule 
is  always  to  be  followed,  that  all  pastors,  elders,  and 
deacons,  should  have  a  testimony  of  their  being  called 
unto  their  respective  offices."^ 

The  Westminster  Confession  makes  the  true,  invisi- 
ble Church  to  consist  of  all  the  elect;  the  visible,  of 
"  all  those  throughout  the  world  that  profess  the  true 
religion,  together  with  their  children.'^  The  doctrine 
of  the  Church  of  England  is  thus  stated  in  her  Arti- 
cles:—Art.  XIX.  ''  The  visible  Church  of  Christ  is  a 
congregation  of  faithful  men,  in  the  which  the  pure 
word  of  God  is  preached  and  the  sacraments  be  duly 
administered  according  to  Christ's  ordinance,  in  all 
those  things  that  of  necessity  are  requisite  to  the 
same." — Art.  XXIII.  "  It  is  not  lawful  for  any  man 
to  take  upon  him  the  office  of  public  preaching  or 
ministering  the  sacraments  in  the  congregation  before 
he  be  lawfully  called  and  sent  to  execute  the  same. 
And  those  we  ought  to  judge  lawfully  called  and 
sent,  which  be  chosen  and  called  to  this  work  by 
men  who  have  public  authority  given  unto  them  in 
the  congregation,  to  call  and  send  ministers  into  the 
Lord's  vineyard." 

Respecting  all  these  definitions  it  may  be  observed, 
(1.)  That  they  recognize  the  true,  spiritual  Church  of 
Christ  as  being  made  up  of  real  believers.  (2.)  In 
every  instance  truth  of  doctrine  is  made  an  essential 
mark  of  a  true  Church.  (3.)  While  a  "ministry"  is 
made  an  essential  attribute  of  a  Church,  nothing  is 
said  or  hinted  of  the  necessity  of  its  being  descended 

»  Lorimer's  Hist.  Prot.  Ch.  of  France,  pp.  32,  33. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  195 

by  an  uninterrupted  series  of  ordinations  from  the 
Apostles.  The  language  of  the  XXXIX  Articles  was, 
as  we  learn  from  Burnet,  designedly  made  indefinite 
on  this  whole  subject.  "  I  come,"  he  says,  "  in  the 
next  place  to  consider  the  second  part  of  this  Article, 
(Article  XXIJI.)  which  is,  the  definition  here  given 
of  those  that  are  lawfully  called  and  sent :  this  is  put 
in  very  general  words,  far  from  that  magisterial 
stiffness  in  which  some  have  taken  upon  them  to 
dictate  in  this  m,atter.  The  article  does  not  re- 
solve this  into  any  particular  constitution,  but  leaves 
the  matter  open  and  at  large  for  such  accidents 
as  had  happened  and  such  as  might  still  happen. 
They  who  drew  it  had  the  state  of  the  several 
churches  before  their  eyes,  that  had  been  different- 
ly reformed;  and  although  their  own  had  been  less 
forced  to  go  out  of  the  beaten  path  than  any  other, 
yet  they  knew  that  -all  things  among  themselves,  had 
not  gone  according  to  those  rules  that  ought  to  be 
sacred  in  regular  times:  necessity  has  no  law,  and 
is  a  law  to  itself."  Accordingly,  the  Article,  it  will  be 
perceived,  is  so  framed  as  not  to  make  either  Prelati- 
cal  Succession  or  Prelatical  ordination  essential  to  a 
true  church  and  a  valid  ministry.  The  condition 
prescribed  in  this  and  every  other  instance,  where  the 
ministry  is  named,  is,  that  it  be  characterized  by 
sound  doctrine.  It  must  be  a  ministry  that  preaches 
'^  the  pure  word,'' ^  and  administers  the  sacraments 
according  to  Christ's  institution.  It  is  not  to  be  in- 
ferred from  this  that  the  eminent  Divines  and  Churches 
that  have  been  named,  favoured  lax  views  on  the 
subject  of  a  call  and  ordination  to  the  ministry.  So 
far  from  it,  it  is  remarkable  with  what  unanimity  and 
cogency  the  Reformers  and  the  theologians  of  the 


196  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

Reformed  Churches  maintain  the  necessity  of  a  divine 
call  as  indispensable  to  a  lawful  entrance  upon  the 
ministry ;  and  the  importance  of  a  formal  investiture 
with  the  office  by  those  already  clothed  with  it.  Still 
they  held  that  the  ministry  belonged  to  tlie  Church, 
not  the  Church  to  the  ministry — that  a  sound  and 
faithful  ministry  whose  preaching  and  labours  would 
edify  and  comfort  his  people,  was  one  of  Christ's 
ascension-gifts  to  his  Cliurch,  the  right  to  which 
is  inalienable — and  that  seeing  such  a  ministry  as 
this  in  any  given  line  might  fail,  the  succession  of  the 
Church  could  not  depend  upon  an  unbroken  succes- 
sion in  the  ministry,  nor  could  she  by  that  defection 
any  more  lose  her  right  to  such  a  ministry  as  Christ 
had  given  her,  than  a  people  whose  magistrates  should 
all  die  or  turn  traitors,  would  thereby  lose  their  right 
to  appoint  other  magistrates  in  their  stead.  While 
they  taught,  therefore,  that  the  function  of  ordination 
was  devolved  upon  the  Ministry,  and  that  no  one 
could  lawfully  assume  that  office,  in  a  settled  Church 
state,  without  being  set  apart  to  it  by  men  already 
ordained,  they  also  taught  that  the  right  of  call  and 
ordination  belonged  essentially  to  the  Church,  and 
that  if  the  ministry  failed,  or  became  apostate,  or 
refused  to  ordain  successors,  the  Church  might,  in 
these  extraordinary  circumstances,  (and  in  these 
only)  resume  the  exercise  of  her  right  and  set  apart 
those  whom  God  had  manifestly  called  to  serve  him 
in  the  Ministry.  Thus  Melancthon  says,  "If  Bishops 
and  Ordinaries  are  enemies  of  the  Church,  or  will  not 
give  orders,  yet  the  Churches  retain  their  right ;  for 
wheresoever  there  is  a  Church,  there  is  a  right  of 
administering  the  Gospel:  wherefore  there  is  a  neces- 
sity that  the  Church  should  retain  the  right  of  callings 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  197 

electing,  and  ordaining  ministers.  And  this  right  is 
a  gift  given  to  tlie  Church,  which  no  human  author- 
ity can  take  from  the  Church,  as  Paul  wittiesseth  in 
the  fourth  of  the  Ephesians:  [see  the  passage  above:] 
where,  therefore,  there  is  a-  true  Church,  there  must 
needs  be  a  right  of  electing  and  ordaining  minis- 
ters." i  Turrettin,  a  theologian  whom  it- would  be 
superfluous  to  praise,  after  discussing  this  question  in 
his  theology,  devotes  several  pages  of  one  of  his  most 
elaborate  Tracts^  to  the  subject.  Without  presenting 
even  an  abstract  of  his  argument,  it  will  be  sufficient 
to  state  that  the  succession  he  contends  for  as  essential 
to  the  Church  and  the  ministry  is  the  succession  of  the 
truth.  .He  observes,  that  as  God  is  a  God  of  order, 
not  of  confusion,  the  order  established  in  a  Church 
is  nor  to  be  violated  except  in  a  case  of  necessity;  but 
that  if  a  case  should  arise  in  which  truth  and  order  are 
so  decidedly  in  conflict  that  one  or  the  other  must  be 
sacrificed,  order  must  yield  to  truth.  Applying  this 
principle  to  the  question  of  ordination,  he  argues  that 
in  an  unsettled  state  of  the  Church,  where  an  adhe- 
rence to  the  established  forms  has  become  utterly  im- 
practicable, the  people,  sooner  than  be  deprived  of  an 
institution  so  essential  to  their  spiritual  welfare,  are 
authorized  to  provide  themselves  with  ministers  in 
an  unusual  way — in  no  case,  however,  are  they  to 
receive  an  individual  as  a  minister,  who  is  not  clearly 
designated  to  the  work  by  the  Providence  and  Spirit 
of  God.  In  corroboration  of  his  views,  he  shows  that 
even  laymen  have  sometimes,  when  placed  in  extra- 
ordinary circumstances,  engaged  successfully  in  the 
work  of  propagating  the  Gospel.     He  instances  those 

'  Dc  Potest.  Episc.  Arg.  2. 

2  <«  De  Necessaria  Seces&ione  nostra  ab  Ecclesia  Romana." 
17* 


198  THE    IIIGH-CIIURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

mentioiTcd  in  Acts  viii.  4,  and  xi.  19-21,  who  being 
"scattered  abroad"  by  the  persecution,  "went  every- 
where preaching  the  gospel;"  whereby  "a  great  num- 
ber beUeved  and  turned  unto  the  Lord:"  also  the  case 
of  ApoUos,  who  being  instructed  in  the  way  of  the 
Lord  by  Aquila  and  Priscilla,  apphed  himself,  appa- 
rently with  no  other  ordination,  to  the  preaching  of 
the  Gospel.  To  these  he  adds  the  interesting  case 
mentioned  by  Theodoret,  of  the  two  Christian  youths, 
Edesius  and  Frumentius,  in  the  reign  of  Constantine 
the  Great,  who  being  made  captives  in  India,  after 
suffering  shipwreck,  converted  the  barbarous  king  of 
the  country  and  man}?-  of  his  subjects  to  Christianity, 
and  established  churches  among  them.  From  these 
and  other  considerations,  he  argues  that  the  flock  of 
Christ  may  lawfully  seek  out  shepherds  for  them- 
selves, when  they  can  obtain  shepherds  in  no  other 
way.  "And  this,"  he  adds,  "  should  the  more  readily 
be  admitted,  because  it  is  certain  and  indubitable  that 
the  right  of  the  call  of  Pastors,  which  was  given 
by  Christ  to  the  Apostles,  and  through  them  to  the 
Church,  does  not  pertain  to  the  Pastors  alone,  or  the 
Church  representative,  but  primarily  and  radically 
resides  in  the  society  of  the  faithful,  or  the  Church 
collective.  This  right  the  Church  has,  for  the  better 
maintenance  of  order,  transferred  to  the  Pastors  or 
Synod.  She  has  not,  however,  so  entirely  relinquish- 
ed it,  but  that  it  is  always  exercised  in  her  name  and 
by  her  authority;  and  if  those  to  whom  she  has  con- 
fided it,  prostitute  it  to  the  propagation  of  error,  she 
can  resume  the  use  of  it." 

In  opposition  to  the  views  expressed  by  these  emi- 
nent men,  and  held  by  the  great  body  of  their  asso- 
ciates, the  High-Church  theory  places   the  Church 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  199 

entirely  at  the  mercy  of  the  Bishops.  They  hold  its 
very  existence  in  their  hands.  If  they  cannot  or  will 
not  perpetuate  the  ministry,  the  Church  itself  comes 
to  an  end.  If  they  become  heretical  and  corrupt,  the 
Church  has  no  redress.  They  may  rule  Christ's 
flock  with  a  rod  of  iron ;  and  they  must  submit  to  it. 
They  may  feed  them  with  the  poison  of  deadly  error, 
instead  of  divine  truth;  and  they  must  receive  it. 
The^'-  may  pervert  and  defile  the  sacraments,  and  add 
indefinitely  to  their  number:  still  the  people  must 
acquiesce.  They  may  take  away  Christ  out  of  the 
Gospel,  and  give  them  "another  Gospel;"  but  they 
are  to  make  no  resistance.  Armed  with  the  "succes- 
sion," their  Bishops  stand  before  them  as  the  vice- 
gerents of  heaven.  They  are  to  be  "as  sure  that 
the  Bishop  is  Christ's  appointed  representative  as  if 
they  actually  saw  upon  his  head  a  cloven  tongue  like 
as  of  fire"^ — to  believe  that  he  is  "commissioned  to 
bid,  on  heavenly  authority,  no  man  despise  them,  and 
to  point  to  those  who,  as  a  class,  as  Bishops  of  the 
Church,  do  despise  them,  the  solemn  words, '  He  that 
despiseth  you,  despiseth  me;  and  he  that  despiseth 
me,  despiseth  him  that  sent  me.'  "^  Where  this 
doctrine  obtains,  the  reformation  of  a  Church,  the 
government  of  which  is  in  the  hands  of  a  corrupt 
and  despotic  Episcopate,  is  next  to  impossible.  To 
oppose  the  Bishops  is  to  "fight  against  God;"  to 
withdraw  from  their  jurisdiction,  is  to  be  guilty  of 
"schism,"  the  blackest  of  all  sins  in  the  High-Church 
calendar :  to  expect  them  to  become  Reformers,  is 
to  expect  lawless  ambition  to  cast  away  its  sceptre, 
and  sensuality  to  bridle  its  own  lusts.     It  will  not  do 

1  Tract  No.  10.  2  Tract  No.  5. 


200  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

to  say  that  such  a  defection  as  this  on  the  part  of 
the  clergy  in  tlie  Une  of  the  succession,  cannot  hap- 
pen. It  was  the  Jewish  priesthood — the  genuine 
"succession-Bishops"  of  that  economy — who  cruci- 
fied tlie  Redeemer  and  put  his  Apostles  out  of  the 
synagogues,  as  "schismatical  intruders"  into  the  min- 
istry. In  the  fourth  century  Arianism  became  the 
authorized  faith  of  the  Church.  It  was  sanctioned 
by  several  councils  both  in  the  East  and  the  West. 
And  so  general  was  the  defection  of  the  clergy  from 
the  true  faith,  that  it  became  a  proverb  respecting 
Athanasius,  who  remained  steadfast  and  was  actually 
deposed  for  his  orthodoxy,  "  The  world  against  Atha- 
nasiuSj  and  Athanasius  against  the  world." — The 
general  corruption  of  the  Romish  clergy  both  as  to 
faith  and  morals  for  centuries  before  the  Reformation, 
and  for  some  time  after  that  great  event,  is  a  fact  as 
well  authenticated  as  the  Reformation  itself.  Cal- 
vin, in  his  treatise  on  the  "Necessity  of  Reforming 
the  Church,"  presented  to  the  imperial  Diet  at  Spires 
in  1544,  thus  expresses  himself  on  this  subject. 
"  They  (the  Bishops)  maintain  that  Christ  left  as  a 
heritage  to  the  Apostles,  the  sole  right  of  appoint- 
ing over  churches  whomsoever  they  pleased,  and. 
they  complain  that  we,  in  exercising  the  ministry 
without  their  authority,  have,  with  sacrilegious  temeri- 
ty, invaded  their  province.  How  do  they  prove  it? 
Because  they  have  succeeded  the  Apostles  in  an  un- 
broken series.  But  is  this  enough  when  all  things 
else  are  different?  It  would  be  ridiculous  to  say  so; 
they  do  say  it,  however.  In  their  elections,  no  ac- 
count is  taken  either  of  life  or  doctrine.  The  right  of 
suifrage  has  been  wrested  from  the  people.  Nay, 
even  excluding  the  rest  of  the  clergy,  the  dignitaries 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCGESS^ION.  201 

have  drawn  the  whole  power  to  themselves 

In  short,  while  they  seem  to  have  entered  mto  a  con- 
spiracy not  to  have  any  kind  of  resemblance  either  to 
the  Apostles  or  the  Holy  Fathers  of  the  Church,  they 
merely  clothe  themselves  with  the  pretence  that  they 
are  descended  from  them  in  an  unbroken  succession, 
as  if  Christ  had  ever  enacted  it  into  a  law,  that  what- 
ever might  be  the  conduct  of  those  who  presided 
over  the  Church,  they  should  be  recognized  as  hold- 
ing the  place  of  the  Apostles,  or  as  if  the  office  were 
some  hereditary  possession  which  transmits  alike  to  the 
worthy  and  the  unworthy.  And  then,  as  is  said  of  the 
Milesians,  they  have  taken  precautions  not  to  admit 
a  single  worthy  person  into  their  society ;  or  if,  per- 
chance, they  have  unawares  admitted  him,  they  do 
not  permit  him  to  remain.  It  is  of  the  generahty  I 
speak.  For  I  deny  not  that  there  are  a  few  good 
men  among  them,  who,  however,  are  either  silent 
from  fear,  or  not  listened  to.  From  those,  then,  who 
persecute  the  doctrine  of  Christ  with  fire  and  sword, 
who  permit  no  man  with  impunity  to  speak  sincerely 
of  Christ,  who,  in  every  possible  way  impede  the 
course  of  truth,  who  strenuously  resist  our  attempt  to 
raise  the  Church  from  the  distressed  condition  into 
which  they  have  brought  her,  who  suspect  all  those 
who  take  a  deep  and  pious  interest  in  the  welfare  of 
the  Church,  and  either  keep  them  out  of  the  ministry, 
or,  if  they  have  been  admitted,  thrust  them  out — from 
such  persons,  forsooth,  it  were  to  be  expected  that  they 
would  with  their  own  hands,  instal  into  the  office  faith- 
ful ministers  to  instruct  the  people  in  pure  religion."^ 
This  reasoning  which  Calvin  employed  against 
the  Romish  Bishops,  is  .equally  conclusive  against 

1  Pp.  90—92,  Lond.  Ed.— See  Appendix. 


202  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

the  same  doctrine  as  urged  by  so-called  Protestant 
Pishops  and  ministers  in  our  day.  To  link  the  Church 
exclusively  and  indissolubly  to  an  unbroken  Pre- 
latical  Succession,  is  to  put  her,  bound  hand  and 
foot,  into  the  hands  of  the  Bishops.  And  if  the 
Bishops  become  corrupt — a  contingency  so  far  from 
being  improbable,  that  their  heresies,  crimes,  and 
schisms  fill  up  a  large  portion  of  ecclesiastical  his- 
tory— the  Church  must  patiently  Avear  her  chains 
until  they  become  sick  of  playing  the  despot,  or  nau- 
seated with- sensuality,  and  set  about  recovering  her 
from  the  miserable  condition  to  which  they  have 
reduced  her.  That  this  is  no  forced  conclusion  from 
the  principles  advocated  by  the  Puseyite  party,  is 
evident  from  the  terms  in  which  they  speak  of  the 
Reformation.  They  tell  us,  for  example,  that  ^"'they 
cannot  allow  the  necessity  of  what  was  done  at  the 
Reformation,  without  proof  quite  overwhelming."  ^ 
"  Too  many  of  us,"  they  say,  "  speak  as  if  we  had 
gained  more  by  the  Reformation  in  freedom,  than  we 
have  lost  by  it  in  disunion." ^  a  \  hate  the  Reforma- 
tion," says  Mr.  Froude,  "  and  the  Reformers  more 
and  more." 3  "Protestantism,"  says  their  late  lead- 
ing organ,  "  in  its  essence  and  in  all  its  bearings,  is 
characteristically  the  religion  of  corrupt  human  na- 
ture.'''^ Again — "The  Protestant  tone  of  doctrine 
and  thought  is  essentially  anti-Christian.''^ ^  This  is 
going  farther,  it  is  probable,  than  the  High-Church 
party  generally  are  yet  prepared  to  go.  But  their 
principles  require  them  to  condemn,  and  there  is  ample 
evidence  that  many  of  them  at  least  do  heartily  con- 

1  Tract,  No.  57.  4  Br.  Crit.  ut.  sup.  p.  27. 

2  Br.  Crit.  for  July,  1841,  p.  2.  5  lb.  p.  29. 

3  Remains  I.  389. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  203 

demn,  the  Reformation  on  the  continent  and  in  Scot- 
land, as  a  schismatical  jebelUon  against  the  just 
authority  of  the  Bishops,  the  authorized  governors  of 
the  Church.  The  parties  engaged  in  perpetuating 
this  "  schism,"  they  refuse  to  recognize  as  any  part 
of  the  Church,  while  their  assiduous  attentions  to 
the  Papal  Hierarchy,  which  in  turn  refuses  to  re- 
cognize them  as  belonging  to  the  Church,  and  re- 
ordains  all  their  Ministers  who  go  over  to  them, 
betray  their  intense  solicitude  to  have  the  "  schism" 
healed. 

These  are  some  of  the  grounds  on  which  we  reject 
the  theory,  that  the  Church  and  the  ministry  are 
linked  to  an  unbroken  personal  succession  of  Prelates. 
This  theory  has  no  support  from  Scripture  or  history; 
and  it  is  wrong  in  its  jminciples.  It  proceeds  upon 
the  assumption  that  an  uninterrupted  chain  of  regu- 
larly ordained  Prelates  is  requisite  as  a  channel  for  the 
transmission  of  divine  grace  from  the  Head  of  the  , 
Church  to  his  members.  It  confounds  the  ojfice  of 
the  ministry,  with  the  officers  who  fill  it.  It  puts 
order  above  truth,  and  form  above  substance.  It 
makes  the  Church  a  mere  appendage  of  the  ministry; 
and  leaves  it  without  redress  if  the  ministry  become 
heretical  or  corrupt.  For  these  and  other  reasons  the 
theory  was  discarded  by  the  Reformers  and  Reform- 
ed Churches.  This  has  been  shown  in  part,  and  some 
further  authorhies  will  now  be  adduced.  It  will  be 
seen  from  these  that  the  succession  they  mainly  insist 
upon,  is,  the  succession  of  the  truth.  They  felt 
the  value  of  order.  They  acknowledged  the  ministry 
as  a  divine  institution;  and  the  symbols  and  creeds 
they  drew  up,  show  with  how  much  care  they  guard- 
ed the  entrance  to  it.     But  they  could  not  believe 


204  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

with  the  Romanists  that  a  pretended  succession  ofj)er- 
sons  was  more  to  be  relied  upon  as  a  note  of  a  true 
Ciiurch  and  ministry,  than  a  succession  of  sound  doc- 
trine. 

Let  us  first  hear  the  Fathers  on  this  subject.  Mr. 
Goode  has  given  us  their  views  in  his  elaborate  work 
on  the  "Divine  Rule  of  Faith  and  Practice."  "I 
know  of  no  promise,"  observes  Mr.  Goode,  (and  his 
own  views  are  worthy  of  attention  in  this  connexion,) 
"that,  whatever  may  be  the  character  or  conduct  of 
the  parties  concerned,  such  a  blessing  (viz.  as  the 
gift  of  the  Holy  Spirit)  shall  be  conferred  in  all  cases 
where  ordination  is  canonically  performed.  And  the 
argument  that  because  our  Lord  promised  his  Apos- 
tles to  be  with  them  even  unto  the  end  of  the  world, 
therefore  he  is  present  with  all  those  canonically  or- 
dained by  outward  succession  from  the  Apostles,  is 
not  worth  answering.  To  assume  that  our  Lord  in 
these  words  spake  to  the  Apostles  only  as  the  repre- 
sentatives of  the  pastors  of  the  Church,  and  not  as 
the  representatives  of  his  disciples  generally,  is,  to 
say  the  least,  unwarranted,  and  to  me  appears  much 
more.  And  thus  thought  Bishop  Pearson,  for  he 
has  expounded  the  promise  as  one  applying  to  the 
Church  at  large,!  following  moreover  in  this  the  in- 
terpretation given  to  the  passage  by  Leo  and  Augus- 
tine. Equally  untenable  is  the  notion  that  the  gift 
conferred  upon  Timothy  by  the  imposition  of  St. 
Paul's  hands  must  necessarily  be  equally  conferred 
by  any  canonical  ordination  performed  now. 

In  fact,  as  to  scriptural  arguments  for  such  a  doc- 
trine, there  can  be  no  pretence  made  to  them."^ 

As  to  the  Fathers,  Mr.   Goode  says — "  I  am  not 

i  On  the  Creed,  p.  512.  2  Goode,  Vol.  II.  p.  92. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  205 

aware  that  such  a  doctrine  (viz.  as  that  of  the  Trac- 
tators,)  was  ever  thought  of  by  the  primitive  fathers." 
He  then  cites  numerous  passages  from  some  of  the  best 
of  the  Fathers,  in  support  of  the  two  following  pro- 
positions, to  wit : — 

(1.)  "That  the  ApostoUcal  Succession  does  not 
secure  to  a  Church  soundness  in  the  fundamentals  of 
the  faith,  and  that  those  who  have  not  the  latter, 
though  they  have  the  former,  are  to  be  avoided. 

(2.)  "  That  the  only  absolutely  essential  point  is 
doctrinal  succession,  or  holding  the  same  faith  the 
Apostles  did ;  and  that  where  that  faith  is  held,  there, 
though  perhaps  labouring  under  irregularities  and 
imperfections  in  other  respects,  Christ's  Church  is 
to  be  found,  and  consequently  the  presence  of  the 
Spirit."! 

I  give  one  or  two  of  the  passages  he  quotes  in 
proof  of  the  latter  of  these  propositions. 

"The  Church,"  says  Jerome,  "does  not  depend 
upon  walls,  but  upon  the  truth  of  its  doctrines.  The 
Church  is  there  where  the  true  faith  is.  But  about 
fifteen  or  twenty  years  ago,  heretics  possessed  all 
the  walls  of  the  churches  here.  For  twenty  years 
ago,  heretics  possessed  all  these  churches.  But  the 
true  Church  was  there  where  the  true  faith  was." 
"A  good  answer  this,  by  the  way,  (Mr.  Goode  adds) 
to  the  common  question  of  the  Romanists  to  the  Pro- 
testant Churches,  where  their  Church  was  before  Lu- 
ther." 

No  less  explicit  is  the  testimony  of  Gregory  Nazi- 
anzen.  Speaking  of  Athanasius  he  says — "  He  was 
not  less  the  successor  of  Mark  in  his  piety,  than  in 

\  Goode,  vol.  ii.  p.  93. 
18 


206  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

his  presidential  seat :  in  the  latter,  indeed,  he  was 
very  far  distant  from  him ;  but,  in  the  former,  he  is 
found  next  after  him ;  which,  in  truth,  is  properly 
to  be  considered  succession.  For  to  hold  the  same 
doctrine  is  to  be  of  the  same  throne  ;  but  to  hold  an 
opposite  doctrine,  is  to  be  of  an  opposite  throne.  '  And 
the  one  has  the  name,  but  the  other  the  reality  of 
succession." 

Let  us  come  now  to  the  Reformers  and  later  di- 
vines. I  am  indebted  for  several  of  the  following 
quotations  to  Mr.  Powell. 

Calvin: — "We  have  pretty  opponents  to  deal  with, 
who,  when  they  are  clearly  convicted  of  corrupting 
the  doctrines  and  worship  of  Christianity,  then  take 
shelter  under  the  pretence  that  no  molestation  ought 
to  be  offered  to  the  successors  of  the  Apostles.  Now 
this  question  of  being  successors  of  the  Apostles,  must 
be  decided  by  an  examination  of  the  doctrines  main- 
tained. To  this  examination,  confident  of  the  good- 
ness of  our  cause,  we  cheerfully  appeal.  Let  them 
not  reply,  that  they  have  a  right  to  assume  that  their 
doctrine  is  Apostolic;  for  this  is  begging  the  question. 
What !  shall  they  who  have  all  things  contrary  to  the 
Apostles,  prove  that  they  are  their  true  successors 
solely  by  the  continuance  of  time?  As  well  might  a 
murderer,  having  slain  the  master  of  the  house  and 
taken  possession  of  the  same,  maintain  that  he  was 
the  lawful  heir For  suppose  that  such  an  un- 
broken line  as  they  pretend,  really  existed,  yet  if  their 
Apostleship  had  perished,  (and  it  necessarily  did  by 
their  corruption  of  God's  worship,  by  their  destruction 
of  the  offices  of  Christ,  by  the  extinction  of  the  light 
of  doctrine  amongst  them  and  the  pollution  of  the 
sacrament,)  what  then  becomes  of  their  succession? 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  207 

Except,  indeed,  as  an  heir  succeeds  to  the  dead,  so 
they,  true  piety  being  extinct  among  them,  succeed  to 
domination.  But  seeing  they  have  changed  entirely 
the  government  of  the  Church,  the  chasm  between 
them  and  the  Apostles  is  so  vast,  as  to  exclude  any 
communication  of  right  from  the  one  to  the  other. 
And  to  conclude  the  point  in  one  word,  I  deny  the 
succession  scheme  as  a  thing  utterly  without  founda- 
tion."! 

Melancthon : — "The  Church  is  not  bound  to  an 
ordinary  succession,  as  they  call  it,  of  Bishops,  but  to 
the  Gospel.  When  Bishops  do  not  teach  the  'truth, 
an  ordinary  succession  avails  nothing  to  the  Church; 
they  ought  of  necessity  to  be  forsaken.'^  2 

Peter  Martyr: — "It  is  a  most  trifling  thing  which 
they  object  against  us  (the  Reformers,)  that  we  want 
the  right  succession.  It  is  quite  enough  that  we  have 
succeeded  to  the  faith  which  the  Apostles  taught,  and 
which  was  maintained  by  the  holy  fathers  in  the  best 
ages  of  the  Church."  ^ 

Bradford  the  Martyr: — "You  will  not  find  in  all 
the  Scripture  this  grand  essential  point  of  the  succes- 
sion of  Bishops."^ 

Bishojj  Jewell: — "  The  grace  of  God  is  promised 
to  pious  souls,  and  to  those  that  fear  God,  and  is 
not  affixed  to  Chairs  and  Successions.''^^  "For 
that  ye  tell  so  many  fair  tales  about  Peter's  succes- 
sion, we  demand  of  you  wherein  the  Pope  succeed- 
eth  Peter  ?  You  answer,  "  He  succeedeth  him  in 
his  chair ;"  as  if  Peter  had  been  some  time  installed 
in  Rome,  and  had  solemnly  sat  all  day  with  his  triple 

'  Vera  Eccl.  Ref.  Ratio.  4  Fox's  Acts  and  Monuments. 

2  Loci  Com.  de  Signis  monstr.  Eccl. 

3  Loci  Com.  CI.  4.  ^  Apology.  , 


208  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

crown,  in  his  Pontijicalibus,  and  in  a  chair  of  gold. 
And  thus,  having  lost  both  religion  and  doctrine,  ye 
think  it  sufficient  at  last,  to  hold  by  the  chair,  as  if  a 
soldier  that  had  lost  his  sword,  would  play  the  man 
with  his  scabbard.  But  so  Caiaphas  succeeded  Aaron ; 
so  wicked  Manasses  succeeded  David  ;  so  may  ^nti- 
chiHst  easily  sit  in  Peter*s  chair."  ^ — The  learned 
Whitaker,  in  confuting  Bellarmine,  observes,  "  This 
argument  proves  not  that  the  succession  oi  persons 
alone  is  conclusive,  or  sufficient  of  itself;  but  only 
that  it  avails  when  they  had  first  proved  (from  the 
Scriptures)  that  the  faith  they  preached  was  the  same 
faith  which  the  Apostles  had  preached  before  them. 
Faith,  therefore,  is,  as  it  were,  the  soul  of  the  succes- 
sion ;  which  faith  being  wanting,  the  naked,  succes- 
sion of  persons  is  like  a  dead  carcase  ivithout  the 
soul.^^  Dr.  Field,  another  distinguished  divine  of 
the  Church  of  England,  says ; — "  Thus  still  we  see 
that  truth  of  doct7nne  is  a  necessary  note  where- 
by the  Church  must  be  known  and  discerned,  and 
not  ministry  or  succession,  or  any  thing  else  with- 
out it."  2 

I  find  another  passage  quite  to  my  purpose  in  the 
thirteenth  examination  of  archdeacon  Philpot,  the 
Martyr,  before  the  archbishop  of  York  and  other 
Popish  dignitaries. 

''York: — 'How  answer  you  this  argument?  — 
Rome  hath  known  succession  of  Bishops;  which  your 
Church  hath  not.  Ergo,  that  is  the  Catholic  Church, 
and  yours  is  not,  because  there  is  no  such  succession 
can  be  proved  in  your  Church.' 

''Philpot: — 'I  deny,  my  Lord,  that  succession  of 
Bishops  is  an  infallible  point  to  know  the  Church  by: 

1  Defence  of  Apology,  p.  634.  2  On  the  Church,  B.  ii.  ch.  6. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  209 

for  there  may  be  a  succession  of  Bishops  known  in  a 
place,  and  yet  there  be  no  church,  as  at  Antioch  and 
Jerusalem,  and  in  otlier  places  where  the  Apostles 
abode  as  well  as  at  Rome.  But  if  you  put  to  the  suc- 
cession of  Bishops,  succession  of  doctrine  withal  (as 
St.  Augustine  doth,)  I  will  grant  it  to  be  a  good 
proof  for  the  Catholic  Church ;  but  a  local  succession 
is  nothing  available.'  ''^ . 

I  add  to  this  series  only  one  more  testimony — that 
of  Bishop  Pilkington.  In  his  "  confutation''  of  the 
charges  brought  against  the  Reformers  (of  whom  he 
was  one)  by  a  popish  writer,  he  has  occasion  to  meet 
and  refute  the  very  theory  of  succession  now  insisted 
upon  by  nominal  Protestants.  I  shall  quote  only  a 
few  sentences  from  his  answer — "  We  do  esteem  and 
reverence  the  continual  succession  of  good  Bishops  la 
any  place,  if  they  can  be  found  ;  if  they  cannot,  we 
run  not  from  God,  but  rather  stick  fast  to  his  word. . . 
Succession  of  good  Bishops,  is  a  great  blessing  of 
God :  but  because  God  and  his  truth  hangs  not  on 
man  nor  place,  we  rather  hang  on  the  undeceivable 
truth  of  God's  word  in  all  doubts,  than  on  any  Bi- 
shops, place,  or  man."  "  The  glorying  of  this  succes- 
sion is  like  the  proud  brags  of  the  Jews,  for  their 
genealogies  and  pedigrees,  saying, '  We  have  Abra- 
ham for  our  father;'  but  our  Saviour,  Christ,  said, 
'  Ye  are  of  the  devil,  your  father,  and  his  works  will 
ye  do.'  So  it  may  be  said  to  these  which  crack  that 
they  have  the  Apostles  for  their  fathers,  that  they 
have  the  Pope  their  father ;  for  his  works  and  doc- 
trine they  follow,  and  not  the  Apostles'.  As  Christ 
our  Lord  therefore  proved  the  Jews  to  be  of  the  devil, 

'  Philpot's  Examinations  and  Writings  •  Parker  Society's  Edit. 
p.  139. 

18* 


210  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

because  they  filled  his  desires,  and  not  the  children  of 
Abraham ;  so  it  is  easy  to  see  whose  children  these 
be,  when  they  follow  the  Pope  and  not  the  Apostles. 
Succession  hi  doctrine  makes  them  the  sons  of  the 
Prophets  and  Apostles,  and  not  setting  in  the  same 
seat  nor  being  bishops  of  the  same  place." — He  names 
several  of  the  most  abandoned  of  the  Popes,  and 
adds — "  This  is  the  goodly  succession  that  he  would 
have  us  to  follow,  of  doctrine  in  Romish  Popes,  .... 
these  be  the  successors  and  fathers,  whom  he  would 
have  us  to  be  like  unto.  God  defend  all  good  folk 
from  all  such  doings,  sayings,  believing,  living,  loving, 
or  following !  Except  God  dwell  and  be  tied  in 
chairs,  seats,  and  places,  he  cannot  dwell  in  such 
wicked  men  as  these  Popes  be."  "  So  stands  the 
succession  of  the  Church,  not  in  mitres,  palaces,  lands, 
or  lordships,  but  in  teaching  true  doctrine,  and  root- 
ing out  the  contrary He  that  does  these  is  the 

true  successor  of  the  Prophets  and  Apostles,  though 
he  live  in  the  wilderness,  as  Elias  did,  or  be  tied  in 
chains,  as  Peter  and  Paul :  he  that  does  not,  is  not 
their  successor  in  deed,  but  in  name  only,  though  he 
have  the  Pope's  blessing,  cruche,  and  mitre,  lands, 
and  palaces,  hallowings  and  blessings,  or  all  that  the 
Pope  has  devised  for  his  Prelates."^ 

These  authorities,  which  might  be  multiplied  if  it 
were  necessary,  show  that  the  High-Church  party  in 
making  a  personal  succession  of  Prelates  the  principal 
mark  of  a  true  church  and  ministry,  have  taken  up  a 
Popish  figment  which  was  rejected  by  the  Reformers 
and  Reformed  Churches,  the  Church  of  England  in- 
cluded. In  insisting  upon  a  succession  oi  sound  doc- 
trine instead  of  a  mere  personal  succession,  the  Re- 

»  Works,  pp.  597—605.    Parker  Soc.  Edit 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  211 

formers  did  not  (as  already  remarked)  intend  to  dis- 
parage the  importance  of  that  order  which  Christ  has 
established  in  his  house.  They  inculcated  submission 
to  lawful  ecclesiastical  authority.  They  taught  that 
separation  from  a  Church  on  any  other  than  impera- 
tive grounds,  was  a  grievous  sin.  Cherishing  the 
ministry  as  a  divine  institution,  while  they  admitted 
that  exigencies  might  occur ^  in  which  the  Church 
would  be  justifiable  in  receiving  as  ministers  indi- 
viduals who  were  evidently  called  of  God  to  the 
work,  but  who  could  not  be  set  apart  to  it  with  all 
the  usual  forms,  they  held  that  the  orderly  method  of 
induction  into  the  sacred  office  was  by  the  laying  on 
of  the  hands  of  those  already  invested  with  it,  and  to 
this  method  of  ordination  they  required  a  rigid  ad- 
herence. An  examination  of  the  public  symbols  of 
the  various  Presbyterian  Churches,  would  show  that 
they  have  guarded  this  point  with  quite  as  much  care 
as  the  Church  of  England.  And  if  it  were  other- 
wise,— if  they  even  practised  lay-ordination — with 
what  consistency  could  they  except  to  it,  who  allow 
women,  in  some  circumstances,  to  administer  one  of 
the  sacraments? 

Without  pursuing  further  this  examination  of  the 
principles  on  which  the  High-Church  theory  rests,  I 
now  assert  as  a  matter  of  fact,  that  whatever  virtue 
there  may  be  in  any  actual  or  supposed  personal  suc- 
cession  in  the   ministry,  belongs  as  really  and 

FULLY  TO    THE  PrESBYTERIAN  ChURCHES  AS   TO    THE 

Episcopal  Church.  .  High- Churchmen  are  much  in 
the  habit  of  boasting  of  the  "antiquity"  of  their 
Church,  as  a  Church  planted  by  the  Apostles,  while 
the  "  sects"  around  them  are  at  most  only  two  or 

1  See  above,  Art.  xxxi.  of  the  French  Prot.  Church. 


212  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

three  centuries  old.  Leaving  other  Churches  to  speak 
for  themselves,  I  have  only  to  say  that  as  far  as  the 
Presbyterian  Churches  are  concerned,  this  glorying  is 
quite  out  of  place.  The  true  Church  of  Christ,  except- 
ing those  portions  of  it  composed  of  the  Waldenses 
and  Albigenses,  and  others  of  an  earlier  date,  who 
refused  submission  to  the  Papal  See,  together  with 
such  real  believers  as  w'ere  preserved  in  the  Oriental 
Churches,  was,  for  a  thousand  years  before  the  Ref- 
ormation, in  the  Church  of  Rome.  They  were  in  it, 
though  not  of'it — in  it,  as  the  Hebrews  were  in  Egypt 
and  afterwards  in  Babylon ;  as  the  seven  thousand  who 
had  not  bowed  the  knee  to  Baal,  were  among  their 
idolatrous  countrymen;  and  as  God's  chosen  ones  at 
the  time  of  the  advent,  the  few  who  "  waited  for  the 
consolation  of  Israel,"  were  mingled  with  the  multi- 
tude whose  priests  and  rulers  were  about  to  crucify 
their  Messiah.  At  the  Reformation,  they,  many  of 
them  at  least,  came  out.  The  English  Reformers  and 
ours  had  the  same  ordination.  As  they  were  alike 
ordained,  so  they  were  alike  deposed  and  excommuni- 
cated by  the  Romish  Church.  If  her  orders  were 
good  for  the  English  Reformers,  they  were  good  for 
ours.  As  to  the  validity  of  her  acts  of  deposition  and 
excommunication,  it  is  a  question  upon  which  there 
is  a  diversity  of  sentiment  among  Protestants.  All 
that  is  essential  to  my  present  argument,  is,  that  if 
those  acts  were  valid  against  a  part  of  the  Reform- 
ers, they  were  valid  against  the  whole.  If  they 
were  a  mere  brutum  fulmen  as  to  one  portion  of 
them,  they  could  be  no  more  as  to  the  rest.  Our 
orders,  then,  at  the  period  of  the  Reformation,  stand 
on  the  same  footing  as  theirs;  and  our  churches, 
whose  or?^m  was  at  least  as  much  earlier  than  theirs 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  213 

as  the  Apostles  were  anterior  to  the  Fathers  of  the 
third  or  fourth  century,  are  also  older  than  theirs  as 
Reformed  Churches ;  for  Presbyterianism  was  estab- 
lished on  the  continent  many  years  before  the  English 
Church  separated  from  Rome.  Before  the  Reforma- 
tion had  made  much  progress  in  the  Church  of  Eng- 
land, the  Puritans — its  pride  and  glory,  if  truth  and 
holiness  have  any  value  above  rhes  and  ceremonies — 
were  driven  out  of  it  by  the  tyranny  of  Elizabeth  and 
her  Bishops.  About  eighty  years  later  that  Church 
was  severed,  by  act  of  Parliament,  from  its  union 
with  the  State,  and  the  Presbyterian  Church  was 
established  in  its  place.  All  the  English  divines  who 
sat  in  the  Westminster  Assembly,  and  very  many 
others  of  that  period,  had  received  Episcopal  ordina- 
tion. It  will  not  be  denied  that  their  orders,  and 
those  of  the  Puritans  and  all  others  who  left  the  Eng- 
lish Church,  were  valid.  From  that  period  to  the 
present,  we  are  far  more  certain  of  an  unbroken  suc- 
cession in  our  ministry  than  Prelatists  can  be  of  theirs. 
Our  ordinations  have  been  performed  with  appropri- 
ate solemnities  and  after  the  Scripture  model,  "  by 
the  laying  on  of  the  hands  of  the  Presbytery:"  and 
while  it  is  necessary  for  them  to  make  out  a  continu- 
ous series  of  Prelates,  each  one  eligible  and  validly 
ordained,  we  have  only  to  make  out  a  continuous 
series  of  Presbyters.  The  state  of  the  question  be- 
tween us,  then,  is  this.  Down  to  the  period  immedi- 
ately subsequent  to  the  Reformation,  our  orders  and 
those  of  the  Episcopal  Church  stand  on  precisely  the 
same  footing.  Since  that  period  ours  have  been  hand- 
ed down — whether  through  the  Reformed  or  Luthe- 
ran Churches  of  the  continent,  the  Church  of  Scotland, 
or  the  Non-Episcopal  Churches  of  England,  Wales, 


214  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

and  Ireland,  —  by  a  series  of  Presbyterial  ordina- 
tions; while  theirs  have  come  down  from  the  same 
sources  througli  a  series  of  prelatical  ordinations. 
The  controversy  resolves  itself,  therefore,  into  the 
question,  whether  Presbyters  have  a  right  to 
ORDAIN.  If  they  have,  our  succession  is  even  better 
than  theirs,  because  it  can  be  traced  with  more  cer- 
tainty. 

The  question  here  stated  has  already  been  argued. 
It  has  been  shown,  if  I  mistake  not,  that  the  Scrip- 
tures distinctly  recognize  the  right  of  ordination  as 
belonging  to  Presbyters.  That  which  has  a  clear 
scriptural  warrant,  needs  no  confirmation  from  other 
sources.  It  may  be  satisfactory,  however,  to  adduce 
a  few  authorities,  which  show  how  the  Bible  has  been 
understood  on  this  point,  by  learned  and  eminent 
divines  of  the  Church  of  England. 

It  was  the  common  sentiment  of  the  English  Re- 
formers, that  Bishops  and  Presbyters  were  of  one 
order — that  they  had  inherently  the  same  powers — 
and  that  the  distinction  between  them,  by  virtue  of 
which  the  right  of  ordination  was  given  exclusively 
to  the  Bishops,  was,  as  Jerome  so  clearly  teaches,  a 
human  arrangement,  adopted  from  views  of  expe- 
diency merely.  Cranmer's  opinion  has  been  often 
quoted :  "  The  Bishops  and  Priests  were  at  one  time, 
and  w^ere  no  two  things;  but  both  one  office,  in  the 
beginning  of  Christ's  religion."  This  was  not  only 
his  opinion,  but  that  of  the  entire  English  Church  in 
his  time,  as  appears  from  two  remarkable  documents 
which  are  thus  referred  to  by  Prynne  in  his  "  Un- 
bishoping  of  Timothy  and  Titus.'' "^  "All  the  Arch- 
bishops, Bishops,  Archdeacons  and  Clergy  of  England, 

'  London,  1636,  p.  106.     Published  anonymously. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  215 

in  their  book  entitled,  '  The  Institution  of  a  Christian 
Man/  subscribed  with  all  their  hands,  and  dedicated 
to  king  Henry  VIII.,  An.  1537,  chapter  of  Orders; 
and  king  Henry  VIII.  himself,  in  his  book  styled  ^A 
necessary  Erudition  for  any  Christian  Man,'  set  out 
by  authority  of  the  statute,  approved  by  the  lords 
spiritual  and  temporal,  and  nether-house  of  Parlia- 
ment, prefaced  with  the  king's  own  royal  epistle,  and 
published  by  his  special  command  in  the  year  1543, 
in  the  chapter  of  Orders;  expressly  resolve,  that 
'  Priests  and  Bishops  by  God's  law  are  one  and  the 
SAME,  and  that  the  power  of  ordination  and  excom- 
munication belongs  equally  to  them  both.'  "  The 
documents  here  mentioned  have  been  preserved  by 
Burnet,  and,  as  his  history  is  generally  accessible,  can 
be  examined  by  those  who  feel  curious  to  see  them. 
The  party  who  are  perpetually  exhorting  men  to 
"  hear  the  Church,"  would  do  well  to  remember  that 
if  their  Church  has  ever  spoken  on  the  question  now 
under  consideration,  her  voice  is  to  be  heard  in 
these  documents.  Are  they  willing  to  *'  hear  the 
Church?" 

I  cite  further  authorities : — "  I  have  ever  declared 
my  opinion  to  be,"  says  Archbishop  Usher,  "  that 
episcopus  et  presbyter  gradu  tantum  differunt  non 
or^me,and,  consequently,  that  in  places  where  Bishops 
cannot  be  had,  the  ordination  by  Presbyters  standeth 
valid." — Dr.  Forbes,  of  Aberdeen:  "Presbyters  have, 
by  divine .  right,  the  power  of  ordaining  as  well  as 
of  preaching  and  baptizing." — Bishop  Burnet:  "No 
Bishop  in  Scotland  during  my  stay  in  that  kingdom, 
(that  is,  from  1643  to  1688,  a  period  of  forty-five 
years,)  ever  did  so  much  as  desire  any  of  the  Pres- 
byters who  went  over  from  the  Church  of  Scotland, 


216  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

to  be  re-ordained."  Lord  Chancellor  King,  after 
showing  that  Presbyters  in  the  primitive  Church  had 
full  authority  to  administer  the  ordinances,  adds  — 
"As  for  ordination,  I  find  clearer  proofs  of  Presbyters 
Ordaining,  than  of  their  administering  the  Lord's 
Supper.''  In  1582,  Archbishop  Grindal  licensed 
John  Morrison,  a  Presbyterian  minister  from  Scot- 
land, to  preach  over  his  whole  province  without 
re- ordination.  1  The  able  author  of  "  Essays  on  the 
Church,"  himself  a  member  of  the  Church  of  Eng- 
land, says,  in  speaking  of  that  Church,  "  It  was  the 
judgment  of  her  founders,  perhaps  unanimously,  but 
at  all  events  generally,  that  the  Bishop  of  the  primi- 
tive Church  was  merely  a  presiding  elder;  a  Pres- 
byter ruling  over  Presbyters;  identical  in  order  and 
commission  ;  superior  only  in  degree  and  in  author- 
ity." ^  It  would  be  easy  to  produce  a  catena  of  emi- 
nent English  divines  from  Cranmer  to  this  day,  in- 
cluding the  present  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  who 
have  held  these  sentiments  and  who  have  recog- 
nized the  Presbyterian  Churches  as  true  Churches. 
The  High-Church  notion  that  Prelacy  rests  upon  a 
divine  right  to  the  exclusion  of  other  systems,  and 
that  Bishops  are  jure  divino  above  Presbyters,  was, 
it  is  well  known,  first  broached  by  Dr.  Bancroft  in  a 
sermon  preached  by  him-  at  Paul's  Cross,  London, 
in  15S8.  The  excitement  occasioned  by  it,  showed 
how  opposed  this  doctrine  was  to  the  views  of  the 
English  divmes  of  that  day.  Sir  Francis  Knolls  wrote 
to  Dr.  Reignolds,  one  of  the  most  learned  and  able 
divines  of  the  age,  to  request  his  opinion  in  relation 

1  The  license  may  be  seen  in  Dr.  Smyth's  learned  work  on  "  Pres- 
bytery  and  Prelacy,"  p.  435. 

2  P.  251.  Lond.  Ed. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  217 

to  the  sentiment  advanced  by  Bancroft,  that  Bishops 
were  superior  to  Presbyters  "  by  God's  ordinance." 
Dr.  Reignold's  reply  is  elaborate  and  explicit. ^  He 
says  Bancroft's  arguments  in  support  of  his  opinion 
are  "partly  weak  and  partly  false."  Against  the 
opinion,  he  cites  Bishop  Jewell,  who,  in  controverting 
the  same  sentiment  as  urged  by  the  Jesuit  Harding, 
had  opposed  to  it  the  names  of  Chrysostom,  Jerome, 
Austin,  and  Ambrose.  To  these  he  adds,  Theodoret, 
Sedulius,  Primasius,  and  Theophylact;  CEcumenius, 
Anselm,  Gregory,  and  Gratian.  "  To  which  it  may 
be  added,"  proceeds  the  Dr.  "that  all  they  who  have 
for  five  hundred  years  last  past  endeavoured  the 
Reformation  of  the  Church,  have  taught  that  all  pas- 
tors, whether  they  be  called  Bishops  or  Priests,  are 
invested  with  equal  authority  and  power. ^^  He  in- 
stances the  Waldenses,  Marsilius  Patavius,  Wickliffe 
and  his  followers,  Huss  and  the  Hussites,  Luther  and 
Calvin,  Bullinger  and  Musculus,  and,  in  England, 
Pilkington,  Humphrey  and  Whitaker,  the  Regius 
Professors  of  Divinity,  Bradford,  Lambert,  and  Fulk  : 
— ^these  all  agree  in  this  matter ;  "  and  so,'^  he  adds, 
"do  all  divines  beyond  sea  that  I  ever  read,  and 
doubtless  many  more  whom  I  never  read.  .  .  .  But 
what  need  I  make  any  further  mention  of  particular 
writers  ?  This  is  the  common  doctrine  of  the  Church- 
es of  Helvetia,  Savoy,  France,  Scotland,  Germany, 
Hungary,  Poland,  Belgium,  and  lastly,  of  England, 
as  the  'Harmony  of  Confessions'  witnesseth.  Where- 
fore, (he  concludes,)  since  Dr.  Bancroft  will  certainly 
never  pretend  that  an   'heresy'  condemned  by  the 

1  It  is  often  referred  to  by  modern  writers.  All  that  part  of  relat- 
ing  to  the  question  in  hand,  may  be  seen  in  Boyse's  "  Ancient  Epis- 
copacy not  Diocesan,"  Lond.  1712,  pp.  13—18, 

19 


218  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

whole  Church  in  its  most  flourishing  times,  was  yet 
accounted  a  sound  and  Christian  doctrine  by  all  these 
I  have  mentioned,  I  hope  he  will  confess  himself 
viistaken  when  he  asserted,  that  the  authority  of  the 
Bishops  over  the  clergy  was  founded  on  divine  insti- 
tution." 

To  this  formidable  afray  of  authorities  I  subjoin 
only  one  more.  It  is  that  of  Mons.  Claude,  the  cele- 
brated French  divine,  who,  after  proving  that  the 
identity  of  Bishops  and  Presbyters  and  the  right  of 
the  latter  to  ordain,  has  the  sanction  of  many  distin- 
guished names  among  the  Fathers  and  later  theologi- 
ans, closes  with  these  words.  "  It  is,  therefore,  a  right 
that  is  naturally  belonging  to  the  Priests  (or  Presby- 
ters) and  of  which  they  cannot  be  deprived  by  human . 
constitution  and  orders.  ...  In  efl'ect,  William,  Bishop 
of  Paris,  has  made  no  scruple  to  say,  according  to  his 
hypothesis,  that  if  there  were  no  more  but  three  mere 
priests  in  the  world,  one  of  them  must  needs  conse- 
crate one  of  the  others  to  be  a  Bishop,  and  the  other 
to  be  an  Archbishop.  And  to  speak  my  own  thoughts 
freely,  it  seems  to  me,  that  that  firm  opinion  of  the 
absolute  necessity  of  Episcopacy,  that  goes  so  high 
as  to  own  no  church,  or  call,  or  ministry,  or  sacra- 
ments, or  salvation  in  the  world,  where  there  are  no 
Episcopal  ordinations,  although  there  should  be  the 
true  faith,  the  true  doctrine  and  piety  there,  and  which 
would  that  all  religion  should  depend  on  a  formality, 
and  even  on  a  formality  that  we  have  shown  to  be 
of  no  other  than  human  institution;  that  opinion,  I 
say,  cannot  be  looked  on  otherwise  than  as  the  very 
worst  character  and  mark  of  the  highest  hypocrisy, 
a  piece  of  Pharisaism  throughout,  that  'strains  at  a 
gnat  when  it  swallows  a  camel;'  and  I  cannot  avoid 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  219 

having  at  least  a  contempt  of  those  kmd  of  thoughts, 
and  a  compassion  for  those  who  fill  their  heads  with 
them."i 

These  extracts  show  that  it  is  the  common  judg- 
ment of  REFORMED  CHRISTENDOM,  a  party  iu  the 
Church  of  England  and  in  the  Episcopal  Church  in 
this  country,  excepted,  that  Bishops  and  Presbyters 
are,  according  to  the  Word  of  God,  of  one  order, 
and  that  presbyters,  equally  with  Bishops,  have  a 
RIGHT  TO  ORDAIN.  It  dctracts  nothing  from  the  force 
of  this  conclusion,  that  the  churches  just  named  prac- 
tically deny  the  validity  of  Presbyterial  ordination. 
We  quote  the  Church  of  England,  both  as  to  theory 
and  practice,  against  itself;  and  leave  it  to  its  friends 
to  harmonize  its  inconsistencies.  As  regards  its  re- 
fusal to  recognize  any  except  Prelatical  ordinations, 
it  is  to  be  regretted  that  that  Church  and  its  daughter 
this  side  the  Atlantic,  should  have  suifered  the  High- 
Church-ism,  which  was  so  heartily  repudiated  by  its 
founders,  to  place  them  in  a  position  which  has  so 
offensive  and  Popish  an  aspect  towards  other  evan- 
gelical churches;  because  this  cannot  but  have  an 
injurious  effect  upon  the  general  interests  of  Chris- 
tianity. But  if  they  choose  to  give  themselves  up  to 
the  sway  of  this  spirit — if  their  Bishops  should  even 
take  Laud  himself,  the  all  but  canonized  "  Confessor 
and  Martyr"  of  the  Oxford  coterie,  for  their  model, 
as,  indeed,  some  of  them  seem  quite  willing  to  do — it 
could  not  cancel  their  past  testimony  to  the  great 
scriptural  truth,  that  Presbyters  and  Bishops  are  iden- 
tical in  order,  and  are,  in  so  far  as  the  divine  institu- 
tion of  the  office  is  concerned,  clothed  ivith  the  same 
powers. 

'  Defence  of  the  Reformation,  II.  286. 


220  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

This  position  being  fully  established  by  the  au- 
thority of  Scripture,  and  confirmed  by  the  amplest 
human  testimonies,  I  now  apply  it  to  the  doctrine  of 
the  SUCCESSION.  I  have  shown  above  that  the  Pres- 
byterian and  Episcopal  Churches  have  the  savie  suc- 
cession down  to  the  period  of  their  separation  from 
Rome;  and  that  the  entire  question  between  us  as 
regards  the  succession  since  that  time,  resolves  itself 
into  the  single  inquiry,  whether  the  right  of  ordina- 
tion belongs  to  Presbyters.  This  question  is  now 
settled  affirmatively,  by  the  common  voice  of  the 
Church  of  England  and  the  other  Reformed  Churches, 
the  Fathers,  and  the  Word  of  God.  Our  succession, 
therefore,  is  proved  to  be  at  least  as  valid,  as  regular, 
and  in  all  respects  as  satisfactory,  as  that  of  the  Epis- 
copal Church  can  be.  I  use  the  phrase  "  at  least," 
to  intimate  that  on  some  grounds  our  succession  is 
better  than  theirs.  So  it  is  undoubtedly  regarded  by 
Presbyterians.  And  that,  not  only  for  the  reason 
already  given,  that  it  can  be  traced  with  more  cer- 
tainty than  theirs;  but  also  because,  in  our  view,  their 
ordinations  are  not  performed  after  the  scriptural 
method.  This  is  virtually  conceded  by  all  those 
Episcopal  divines  (and  we  have  seen  that  they  at 
one  period  embraced,  as  far  as  can  be  ascertained, 
the  entire  clergy  of  the  English  Establishment,)  who 
teach  that  Presbyters  are  by  Divine  appointment  one 
with  Bishops,  and  that  the  sole  power  of  ordination 
has  been  given  to  the  Bishops  by  a  mere  human  com- 
pact. This  is  the  same  as  to  say  that  ordinations 
were  originally  performed  by  Presbyters.  With  us, 
they  are  performed  by  Presbyters  still.  Which  has 
adhered  to  the  Divine  model  ?  Their  ordinations  of 
Presbyters,  again,  are  performed  by  a  single  indivi- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  221 

dual.  We  read  of  no  such  instance  in  the  New  Tes- 
tament: and  our  ministers  are  set  apart  by  apkiraUty 
of-ordainers.  Which  Church  has  followed  the  model 
here  ? — I  do  not  mention  these  defects  as  vitiating 
their  orders;  but  defects  they  certainly  are.  And 
in  arguing  with  a  party  who  lay  so  much  stress  upon 
forms,  it  is  proper  to  refer  to  them  as  exhibiting  the 
superiority  of  our  succession  to  that  which  is  a  ground 
of  so  much  unseemly  boasting  with  a  certain  order 
of  Prelatists. 

It  has  been  my  aim  in  this  chapter  to  show, 

1st.  That  the  theory  which  would  suspend  the 
Church  and  the  ministry  upon  an  unbroken  succession 
of  Prelates,  is  radically  wrong  in  its  principles. 

2dly.  That  this  theory  is  at  variance  with  the  sen- 
timents of  the  Reformers,  and  with  the  doctrines  of 
the  Protestant  Churches  as  expressed  by  their  leading 
divines  and  in  their  creeds  and  symbols. 

3dly.  That  the  succession  which  constitutes  the 
chief  mark  of  a  true  Church  and  ministry,  is  a  suc- 
cession of  sound  doctrine.     And, 

4thly.  That,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  Presbyterian 
Churches  enjoy  all  the  advantages  of  ?i  personal  suc- 
cession which  can  fairly  be  claimed  for  the  Episcopal 
Church. 

There  are  many  questions  connected  with  this  sub- 
ject which  afford  matter,  some  of  them,  for  curious 
speculation,  others,  for  mature  and  profitable  inquiry 
and  reflection.  Into  these  questions  I  have  neither 
the  time  nor  the  disposition  to  enter.  One  thought 
which  will  be  likely  to  suggest  itself  to  those  who 
have  followed  the  train  of  this  discussion,  is,  that 
they  assume  a  grave  responsibility,  who  would  appro- 
priate all  the  rights  and  privileges  of  the  Church  of 

19* 


222  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

Christ,  all  the  promises  of  the  Gospel  and  the  gifts 
of  salvation,  to  societies  prelatically  organized.  If, 
as  the  XXXIX  Articles  teach,  "the  visible  Church 
of  Christ  is  a  congregation  of  faithful  men,  in  the 
which  the  pure  word  of  God  is  preached  and  the 
sacraments  be  duly  administered,"  it  must  be  not 
merely  a  violation  of  Christian  charity,  but  a  sin 
against  Christ  himself,  to  deny  the  character  of  a 
Church  to  any  society  possessing  these  attributes. 
This  is  a  matter,  let  it  be  observed,  which  concerns 
High-Churchmen,  much  more  than  it  does  Non-Epis- 
copalians. With  us  it  is  a  small  matter  to  be  judged 
of  man's  judgment. 

And  even  if  we  were  sensitive  to  the  opinions  of 
our  fellow-men  on  this  question,  the  assumptions  of 
the  Puseyite  school  could  not  disturb  our  equanimity, 
counterpoised  as  they  are  by  the  united  testimony  of 
alU  the  Reformed  Churches.  But  it  may  not  be  so 
small  a  matter  for  them  to  brand  as  "  schismatical 
organizations,"  churches  which  God  has  owned  as 
his  own  planting,  and  which  he  has  richly  adorned 
with  the  gifts  and  graces  of  his  Spirit.  After  all, 
litowever,  this  conduct  ought  not  to  excite  surprise.  A 
party  who  can  court  the  friendship  of  the  Church  of 
Rome,  would  be  strangely  inconsistent  not  to  shun 
communion  with  the  Reformed  churches.  Their  Ar- 
ticles, as  we  have  just  seen,  make  ''the  preaching  of 
the  pure  word  of  God  and  the  due  administration  of 
the  sacraments,"  the  essential  marks  of  a  true  Church. 
No  society  which  lacks  these  marks,  can,  according  to 
these  Articles,  be  a  true  Church.     But  they  acknow- 

'  The  few  Clmrches  on  the  Continent  which  have  adopted  a  modi- 
fied  Prelacy  on  grounds  of  expediency  merely,  are  not  properly  excep- 
tions to  this  remark. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  223 

ledge  the  Romish  Church  as  a  true  Church;  and  if 
they  beheve  their  own  Articles,  they  must,  of  course, 
believe  that  she  has  these  characteristics.  What 
other  treatment,  then,  could  Protestants  look  for 
from  men  who  hold  that  ^' the  pure  word  of  God  is 
preached"  in  the  Church  of  Rome;  and  that  the 
Lord's  Supper  is  "  duly  administered''^  when  one  of 
the  elements  is  withheld  from  the  people,  and  the 
other,  first  transubstantiated  "into  the  body  and  blood, 
yea,  the  whole  soul  and  divinity"  of  Christ,  and  then 
offered  up,  in  the  midst  of  heathenish  rites,  as  a 
"sacrifice?"  It  would  be  very  unreasonable  for 
Protestant  Churches  to  expect  to  be  recognized  as 
Churches  by  persons  entertaining  these  views.  For 
it  is  certain  that  if  Rome  has  "  the  pure  preaching  of 
the  word  and  the  due  administration  of  the  sacra- 
ments," we  have  not ;  and  vice  versa.  And  to  sup- 
pose that  any  set  of  individuals  can  find  these  two 
essential  notes  of  a  true  Church,  both  in  that  Church 
and  the  Reformed  Churches,  is  to  suppose  them  capa- 
ble of  impossibilities.  It  will  be  time  enough  for  them 
to  acknowledge  our  Churches,  when  they  shall  have 
discovered  that  to  recite  from  the  pulpit  the  idle 
legends  and  "  lying  wonders"  of  Popery,  is  not  pre- 
cisely what  our  Saviour  meant  when  ho  said,  "  Go, 
PREACH  THE  GospEL;"  and  that  when  he  instituted 
the  Lord's  Supper,  he  contemplated  something  a  little 
different  from  transubstantiation. 


224  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 


CHAPTER  VII. 

CHARACTERISTICS  AND  TENDENCIES    OF   THE    HIGH-CHURCH 
SYSTEM. THE  RULE  OF  FAITH. 

I  HAVE  endeavoured  to  show  that  the  dogma  of  an 
unbroken  Prelatical  Succession  is  condemned  by  the 
united  testimony  of  Scripture,  History,  and  familiar 
and  admitted  facts.  I  have  also  attempted  to  ex- 
pose the  fallacy  of  the  principles  on  which  it  rests, 
and  have  contrasted  it  with  the  true  doctrine  of 
Succession  as  laid  down  in  the  New  Testament,  and 
held  by  the  Fathers  and  all  the  Reformed  Churches. 
Here  the  discussion  might  with  propriety  be  arrested. 
The  dogma  in  question,  however,  is  a  radical  part  of 
a  System,  some  of  the  characteristics  and  ten- 
dencies of  which  it  may  be  well  to  notice  before  dis- 
missing the  subject.  Of  this  system,  the  late  celebra- 
ted Dr.  Arnold  has  given  the  following  concise  and 
lucid  summary. 

"  *  The  sacraments,  and  not  preaching,  are  the 
sources  of  divine  grace.'  So  it  is  said  in  the  adver- 
tisement prefixed  to  the  first  volume  of  the  Tracts  for 
the  Times.  But  the  only  security  for  the  efficacy  of 
the  sacraments,  is  the  Apostolical  commission  of  the 
•Bishops,  and,  under  them,  of  the  Presbyters  of  the 
Church.  So  it  is  said  in  the  preamble  to  the  resolu- 
tions already  quoted.  These  two  doctrines  are  the 
foundation  of  the  whole  system.  God's  grace  and  our 
salvation  come  to  us  principally  through  the  virtue  of 
the  sacraments;  the  virtue  of  the  sacraments  depends 
on  the  Apostolical  succession  of  those  who  administer 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  225 

them.  The  clergy,  therefore,  thus  holding  in  their 
hands  the  most  precious  gifts  of  the  Church,  acquire 
naturally  the  title  of  the  Church  itself ;  the  Church,  as 
possessed  of  so  mysterious  a  virtue,  as  to  communi- 
cate to  the  only  means  of  salvation  their  saving  effi- 
cacy, becomes  at  once  an  object  of  the  deepest  rever- 
ence. What  wonder  if  to  a  body  endowed  with  so 
transcendent  a  gift,  there  should  be  given  also  the 
spirit  of  wisdom  to  discern  all  truth;  so  that  the 
solemn  voice  of  the  Church  in  its  creeds,  and  in  the 
decrees  of  its  general  councils,  must  be  received  as 
the  voice  of  God  himself.  Nor  can  such  a  body  be 
supposed  to  have  commended  any  practices  or  states 
of  life  which  are  not  really  excellent,  and  the  duty 
either  of  all  Christians,  or  of  those,  at  least,  who  would 
follow  the  most  excellent  way.  Fasting,  therefore, 
and  the  state  of  celibacy,  are,  the  one  a  Christian 
obligation,  the  other  a  Christian  perfection.  Again, 
being  members  of  a  body  so  exalted,  and  receiving 
our  very  salvation  in  a  way  altogether  above  reason, 
we  must  be  cautious  how  we  either  trust  to  our  indi- 
vidual conscience,  rather  than  to  the  command  of  the 
Church,  or  how  we  venture  to  exercise  our  reason  at 
all  in  judging  of  what  the  Church  teaches:  childlike 
faith  and  childhke  obedience  are  the  dispositions 
which  God  most  loves.  What,  then,  are  they  who 
are  not  of  the  Church,  who  do  not  receive  the  sacra- 
ments from  those  who  can  alone  give  them  their  vir- 
tue? Surely  they  are  aliens  from  God,  they  cannot 
claim  his  covenanted  mercies ;  and  the  goodness 
which  may  be  apparent  in  them,  may  not  be  a  real 
goodness.  God  may  see  that  it  is  false,  though  to  us 
it  appear  sincere :  but  it  is  certain  that  they  do  not 
possess  the  only  appointed  means  .of  salvation;  and 


226  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

therefore  we  must  consider  their  state  as  dangerous, 
although  we  may  not  venture  to  condemn  them."i 

The  system  here  delineated  is  held  with  various 
unimportant  modifications,  by  the  Puseyite  party  on 
both  sides  of  the  Atlantic.  Reserving  a  fuller  exhi- 
bition of  it  for  the  next  chapter,  I  design  in  this  to 
show,  (and  it  is  not  the  least  exceptionable  feature 
of  the  system,)  that  it  proposes  an  unauthorized 

AND  DELUSIVE   RuLE   OF  FaITH. 

Its  advocates  express  themselves  with  considerable 
diversity  of  sentiment  on  this  subject,  while  they  agree 
in  repudiating  the  right  of  private  judgment  and  the 
great  Protestant  principle  that  the  Bible  alone  is  the 
only  and  all-sufficient  rule  of  faith.  The  Bible  no 
more  meets  the  exigencies  of  this  system,  than  it  does 
the  demands  of  the  Romish  Church:  and  Romanists 
and  High-Churchmen  dread — and  for  the  same  rea- 
son— the  free  exercise  of  private  judgment  in  inter- 
preting the  Scriptures.  It  has  been  the  common 
expedient  of  errorists  in  all  ages  to  cry  down  the 
Bible  and  cry  up  tradition.  This  was  done  by  the 
Valentinian  heretics  even  as  early  as  the  time  of  Ire- 
nseus,  who  says  of  them — "  When  they  are  reproved 
from  the  Scriptures,  they  immediately  begin  to  accuse 
the  Scriptures  themselves;  asif  they  were  not  correct, 
nor  of  authority,  and  that  they  are  not  consistent; 
and  that  the  truth  cannot  he  found  out  from  them 
by  those  who  are  ignorant  of  traditlon.^'^  This  is 
precisely  the  Puseyite  doctrine.  The  Bible  is  a  very 
obscure  book,  and  can  be  understood  only  by  the  aid 
of  "  Catholic  tradition."  The  Church  is  the  author- 
ized expounder  of  the  sacred  volume,  and  we  are 

'  Christian  Life,  Pref.  p.  xv. 

i  Cited  by  Goode,  on  the  Rule  of  Faith,  I.  308. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  227 

bound  to  defer  to  her  interpretation  of  it.  Thus  they 
say,  the  notion  of  the  Bible  being  "  tlie  sole  auihor- 
itative  judge  in  controversies  of  faith,  is  a  self-de- 
structive principle.^  ^^  "The  Rule  of  faith"  is  "made 
up  of  Scripture  and  Tradition  together."^  "When 
the  sense  of  Scripture,  as  interpreted  by  reason,  is 
contrary  to  the  sense  given  to  it  by  Catholic  antiquity, 
we  ought  to  side  with  the  latter." ^  "The  unanimous 
witness  of  Christendom  is  the  only  and  the  fully  suffi- 
cient, and  the  really  existing  guarantee  of  the  whole 
revealed  faith. "^  "  The  Church  is,  in  matter  of  fact, 
our  great  divinely  appointed  guide  into  saving  truth, 
under  divine  grace,  whatever  may  be  the  abstract 
power  or  satficiency  of  the  Bible."*  "That  the  Bible 
is  in  the  hands  of  the  Church  to  be  dealt  with  in  such 
a  way  as  the  Church  shall  consider  best  for  the  ex- 
pression of  her  own  mind  at  the  time.  .  .  may  surely 
be  considered  as  a  Catholic  axiom." ^  "The  true 
Catholic  pastor  who  thus  receives  the  word  of  God, 
with  the  transmitted  witness  of  the  Church,  who 
guides  himself  by  the  Holy  Scriptures,  not  as  he 
understands  them,  but  as  Catholic  antiquity  has 
revealed  and  Catholic  consent  has  kept  their  mean- 
ing, will  be  chastised  and  schooled  by  this  submission 
of  his  judgment  to  the  wise  and  good  of  every  age, 
into  that  childlike  spirit  which  God  will  bless."^ 

The  first  question  that  will  suggest  itself  to  a 
thoughtful  mind,  on  reading  these  extracts,  is,  what 
is  meant  by  the  phrases,  "  Catholic  antiquity,"  and 
"Catholic  tradition?"     The  many-voiced  answer  to 

'  Newman  on  Romanism,  p.  35.  5  Brit,  Crit.  vol.  24.  254. 

2  Keble's  Serm.  p.  82.  6  lb.  No.  60,  p.  453. 

^  Newman  on  Romanism,  p.  160.  "^  Bp.  Doane,  Troy  Ser.  p.  23. 
4  Tract  78. 


228  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

this  question  furnishes  a  fine  illustration  of  the  beau- 
tiful simplicity  of  the  proposed  rule  of  faith.  With 
some,.  "Catholic  antiquity'^  means  the  first  two  hun- 
dred, with  others,  the  first  three  hundred  and  fifty, 
with  others  still,  the  first  six  hundred,  years  of  the 
Christian  era.  "  Catholic  tradition"  is,  with  one  class, 
summed  up  in  the  Nicene  and  the  so-called  "Apos- 
tles'" Creeds:  with  a  second,  it  comprises  the  decrees 
of  four,  and  with  a  third,  the  decrees  of  six  general 
councils.  The  selection  of  these  four  or  six  councils 
out  of  the  whole  series  of  early  Synods,  is  left  to  each 
man's  judgment  or  caprice.  Mr.  Palmer  names  six 
which  he  admits  as  oecumenical  and  of  "binding 
authority;"  and  excludes  nine  others  which  were 
held  before  the  division  of  the  eastern  and  western 
churches.  Among  the  latter  is  the  Synod  of  Arimi- 
num  which  he  rejects  because  it  was  attended  by  only 
four  hundred  Bishops,  and  could  not,  therefore,  be 
recognized  "as  the  universal  Church."  Yet  of  the 
six  he  acknowledges,  only  one  had  so  many  as  four 
hundred  Bishops ;  and  the  numbers  that  attended  tlie 
other  five  respectively,  were  as  follows:  three  hun- 
dred and  eighteen,  one  hundred  and  fifty,  two  hun- 
dred, one  hundred  and  sixty-five,  and  one  hundred  and 
seventy.  Yet  these  Synods  were,  that  was  not,  "the 
universal  Church!"  My.  Palmer  could  have  given  a 
better  reason  for  excluding  the  council  of  Ariminum, 
had  he  seen  fit.  That  council  sanctioned  the  Jirian 
heresy:  and  to  recognize  an  heretical  Synod  as  oecume- 
nical, would  spoil  the  theory  that  oecumenical  Synods 
cannot  err. — The  Romanists,  again,  include  in  their 
rule  of  faiih  the  traditions,  written  and  unwritten,  of 
the  Church,  (that  is,  of  their  own  Church,)  in  all  ages; 
while  High-Churchmen  would  discriminate  between 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  229 

Catholic  and  im-Catholic  traditions,  by  applying  the 
famous  rule  of  Vincent,  the  monk  of  Lerins,  "  Quod 
semper,  quod  itbique,  quod  ah  omnibus  traditum 
est,^^  that  is,  we  are  to  believe  "whatever  has  been 
delivered  always,  every  lohere,  and  by  all.^^ 

It  is  obvious  that  our  rule  of  faith  will  be  one  thing 
or  another  according  as  we  adopt  one  or  another  of 
these  definitions  of  "Catholic  antiquity''  and  "Catho- 
lic tradition."  Who  is  to  decide  this  preliminary 
question?  A  traditionist  would  reply,  "  the  Church." 
But,  not  to  ask  here  what  authority  the  Church  has 
to  determine  this  point,  the  answer  assumes  that  "the 
Church"  is  known  and  recognized.  Before  I  can 
suffer  any  society  or  institute  to  decide  so  important 
a  question  for  me,  I  must  know  that  it  is  the  Church. 
And  this  I  can  be  assured  of  only  by  comparing  its 
characteristics  with  the  marks  of  a  true  Church  as 
prescribed  in  the  Scriptures.  In  other  words,  I  must 
use  my  private  judgment  in  finding  out  the  true 
Church,  before  I  can  suffer  the  Church  to  fix  for  me 
the  bounds  and  metes  of  that  "antiquity"  and  "  tradi- 
tion" which  are  to  enter  into  my  rule  of  faith.  If,  on 
the  other  hand,  I  define  these  important  terms  for  my- 
self, this,  again,  involves  the  exercise  of  my  private 
j  udgment.  In  either  case,  it  is  private  judgment  that 
decides  the  fundamental  question,  "  What  is  the  Rule 
of  Faith."  And  if  private  judgment  may  be,  and 
must  be,  so  far  trusted  as  to  decide  this  question,  it  is 
not  easy  to  see  why  it  may  not  be  allowed,  under  that 
responsibility  which  every  human  being  owes  to  his 
Creator,  to  interpret  the  Scriptures  also. 

Supposing  an  individual  to  have  made  his  election 
out  of  the  various  and  frequently  conflicting  meanings 
attached  to  the  phrases  that  have  been  quoted,  an- 

20 


230  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

Other  question  will  present  itself  for  his  consideration, 
viz.  "  What  claim  has  *  Catholic  tradition'  to  constitute 
a  part  of  the  Rule  of  Faith?  Why  am  I  boaind  to  in- 
terpret the  Bible  according  to  the  teachings  of  the 
'early  Church?'  " 

That  we  are  under  great  obligations  to  the  Christian 
Fathers  and  primitive  Christians,  is  a  point  upon  which 
there  can  be  no  debate.  We  are  indebted  to  them, 
under  Providence,  for  the  canon  of  Scripture.  We 
rely  entirely  upon  their  testimony,  in  so  far  as  external 
evidence  is  concerned,  for  our  knowledge  of  the  fact 
that  the  books  now  composing  the  Bible  were  design- 
ed to  constitute  the  sacred  canon.  We  learn  from 
them  that  the  change  of  the  Sabbath  from  the  seventh 
to  the  first  day  of  the  week,  which  is  indeed  distinct- 
ly implied  in  the  New  Testament,  was  universally 
recognized  by  the  first  Christians.  We  have  also  their 
attestation  to  the  general  prevalence  in  their  day,  of 
those  doctrines  which  are  now  imbodied  in  the  creeds 
and  formularies  of  the  Reformed  Churches.  Besides 
this,  some  of  the  Fathers  have  left  useful  treatises  and 
sermons  on  practical  subjects,  and  expositions  of  por- 
tions of  Scripture  of  greater  or  less  value.  But  in 
saying  this,  we  by  no  means  sanction  the  idea  that 
their  writings  are  to  be  admitted  as  an  essential  part 
of  the  rule  of  faith.  We  regard  the  Fathers  as  Wit- 
nesses. In  this  capacity  they  testify  to  certain  yfl5c/.y — 
such  for  example,  as  the  exclusive  canonicity  of  the 
sacred  books  we  have  now,  and  the  universal  observ- 
ance of  the  "  Lord's  day."  Relying  upon  their  com- 
petency and  credibility,  we  receive  these  and  other 
facts  on  their  testimony.  On  the  same  ground  we 
receive  it  as  a  fact  that  certain  doctrines  which  are 
concisely  presented  in  the  early  creeds,  were  current- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  231 

ly  embraced  as  of  divine  origin  and  obligation  in  the 
Churches  of  their  day.  And  this  fact,  all  ingenuous 
persons  will  admit,  carries  with  it  a  very  strong 
presumption  in  favour  of  the  truth  of  those  doctrines. 
But  whether  the  doctrines  are  taught  in  Scripture, 
is  a  point  we  must  decide  for  ourselves.  Because 
a  man  may  be  a  good  witness  to  the  authenticity 
of  a  disputed  document,"  it  does  not  follow  that  he 
is  better  qualified  than  any  one  else  to  interpret  the 
document,  or  that  others  are  bound  to  receive  his  in- 
terpretation. All  that  he  can  claim  for  his  construc- 
tion of  it,  is  such  a  measure  of  respect  as  he  may  be 
entitled  to  from  his  probity,  abilities,  and  opportuni- 
ties of  arriving  at  a  just  view  of  its  meaning.  This 
is  precisely  what  we  concede  to  the  Fathers.  Ro- 
manists and  High-Churchmen,  however,  demand  that 
we  shall  allow  the  Fathers  to  expound  the  Scriptures 
for  us.  Their  "traditions"  are  to  be  made  of  co- 
ordinate authority  with  the  Bible,  or  rather  to  be 
raised  above  it.  "  Catholic  tradition,"  says  Mr.  Keble, 
"teaches  revealed  truth.  Scripture  proves  it;  Scripture 
is  the  document  of  faith,  tradition  the  witness  of  it ; 
the  true  creed  is  the  catholic  interpretation  of  Scrip- 
ture, or  scripturally  proved  tradition;  Scripture  by 
itself  teaches  mediately,  and  proves  decisively;  Scrip- 
ture and  tradition  taken  together  are  the  joint  rule  of 
faith."  This  is  sufficiently  explicit.  Tradition  is  the 
primary,  and  Scripture  the  secondary  teacher  of  Di- 
vine truth.  Tradition  teaches.  Scripture  proves.  The 
Bible  is  degraded  into  a  mere  echo  of  tradition.  It 
can  speak  only  in  harmony  with  tradition.  It  is  a 
rule  of  faith  only  as  it  accords  with  tradition.  And 
tradition,  according  to  the  same  writer,  includes  "  un- 
written as  well  as  written"  traditions — an  oral  law, 


232  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

"  independent  of,  and  distinct  from  the  truths  which 
are  directly  scriptural^  It  would  be  more  consist- 
ent in  Mr.  Keble,  and  those  who  think  with  him,  to 
omit  the  Bible  altogether  in  their  definition  of  the 
Rule  of  Faith.  This  is  done  in  fact  by  such  a  theory 
as  that  propounded  by  them,  and  it  would  be  more 
respectful  to  the  Word  of  God  to  do  it  also  in  form. 
For  if  ^'Catholic  antiquity"  or  "the  Church,"  is  en- 
trusted with  another  revelation  which  takes  prece- 
dence of  the  Bible  and  to  which  the  latter  must  con- 
form, why  not  dispense  with  the  Bible  altogether?  To 
bring  it  forward  merely  as  an  automaton,  to  speak  at 
the  bidding  of  tradition,  and  utter  only  such  sounds 
as  that  may  dictate,  is  in  bad  taste,  and  savors  much 
of  irreverence.  It  is  in  truth  the  Popish  doctrine 
veiled  in  too  thin  a  guise  to  hide  its  deformity. 

But  the  question  returns — What  claim  has  tradition 
to  this  "dominion  over  our  faith?"  What  warrant 
has  "  Catholic  antiquity"  to  impose  her  exposition  of 
the  Bible  upon  all  subsequent  generations?  If  it  be 
said,  "It  is  reasonable  to  presume  that  those  who 
lived  near  the  time  of  the  Apostles,  would  be  more 
likely  to  know  their  real  sentiments  than  people  living 
ages  later,  and  that  we  ought  therefore  to  defer  to 
their  teachings;"  I  reply,  first,  by  referring  to  what 
has  already  been  said  about  the  measure  of  respect 
due  to  the  Fathers,  and  which  it  4s  not  necessary  to 
repeat  in  this  connexion.  Secondly — as  regards  the 
supposed  familiarity  of  the  Fathers  with  the  views  of 
the  Apostles,  nothing  is  more  certain  than  that  many 
of  their  expositions  of  the  Apostolical  epistles  are 
fanciful  and  absurd — that  their  writings  abound  in 
idle  fables  and  legends — that  some  of  them  fell  into 
grievous  errors — and  that  even  before  the  Apostles  had 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  233 

all  died,  gross  corruptions  in  doctrine  and  practice  had 
disclosed  themselves  in  the  churches.  Our  great  Epic 
poet  has  well  illustrated  this  point,  in  his  treatise  "  of 
Prelatical  Episcopacy."  In  speaking  of  the  degree 
of  credit  due  to  the  Fathers,  he  instances  the  case  of 
Papias,  "  a  very  ancient  writer,  one  that  had  heard 
St.  John,  and  was  known  to  many  that  had  seen  and 
been  acquainted  with  others  of  the  Apostles ;  but  who 
being  of  a  shallow  wit,  and  not  understanding  those 
traditions  which  he  received,  filled  his  writings  with 
many  new  doctrines  and  fabulous  conceits."  Accord- 
ing to  Eusebius,  "  divers  ecclesiastical  men,  and  Ire- 
nseus  among  the  rest,  while  they  looked  at  the  antiquity 
of  this  man,  became  infected  with  his  errors."  "Now 
(Milton  proceeds)  if  Irenaeus  was  so  rash  as  to  take 
unexamined  opinions  from  an  author  of  so  small  capa- 
city, when  he  was  a  man,  we  should  be  more  rash 
ourselves  to  rely  upon  those  observations  which  he 
made  Avhen  he  was  a  boy.  And  this  may  be  a  suffi- 
cient reason  to  us  why  we  need  no  longer  muse  at 
the  spreading  of  many  idle  traditions  so  soon  after 
the  Apostles,  while  such  as  this  Papias  had  the  throw- 
ing them  about,  and  the  inconsiderate  zeal  of  the  next 
age,  that  heeded  more  the  person  than  the  doctrine, 
had  the  gathering  them  up.  Wherever  a  man  who 
had  been  any  way  conversant  with  the  Apostles  was 
to  be  found,  thither  flew  all  the  inquisitive  ears, 
although  the  exercise  of  right  instructing  was  changed 
into  the  curiosity  of  impertinent  fabling:  where  the 
mind  was  to  be  edified  with  solid  doctrine,  there  the 
fancy  was  soothed  with  solemn  stories:  with  less  fer- 
Vjency  was  studied  what  St.  Paul  or  St.  John  had 
written,  than  was  listened  to  one  that  could  say — 
^  Here  he  taught,  here  he  stood,  this  was  his  stature, 
20* 


234  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

and  thus  he  went  habited;  and,  0  happy  this  house 
that  harboured  him,  and  that  cold  stone  whereon  he 
rested,  this  village  wherein  he  wrought  such  a  mira- 
cle, and  that  pavement  bedewed  with  the  warm  effu- 
sion of  his  last  blood,  that  sprouted  up  into  eternal 
roses  to  crown  his  martyrdom.'  Thus,  while  all  their 
thoughts  were  poured  out  upon  circumstances,  and 
the  gazing  after  such  men  as  had  sat  at  table  with 
the  Apostles,  (many  of  which  Christ  hath  professed, 
yea,  though  they  had  cast  out  devils  in  his  name,  he 
will  not  know  at  the  last  day,)  by  this  means  they  lost 
their  time,  and  truanted  in  the  fundamental  grounds 
of  saving  knowledge,  as  was  seen  shortly  by  their 
writings."  1 

Now,  whether  Milton's  estimate  of  the  fathers  be 
correct  or  not,  it  is  certain  that  the  mere  circumstance 
of  their  having  lived  nearer  the  Apostolic  age  than 
we  do,  does  not  of  itself  confer  upon  them  any  author- 
ity to  regulate  our  faith.  We  are  willing  to  treat 
their  "traditions"  with  due  respect;  but  when  we 
are  required  to  receive  them  as  of  co-ordinate  obliga- 
tion with  the  word  of  God,  we  must  insist  upon  a 
clear  scriptural  warrant  for  this  claim  before  we  can 
allow  it.  If  it  was  the  intention  of  the  Saviour  that 
the  revelation  contained  in  his  written  word  should 
be  supplemented  by  tradition,  and  that  the  traditions 
of  the  first  [e\v  centuries  should  be  perpetually  recog- 
nized as  the  only  proper  guide  to  the  interpretation 
of  Scripture,  it  will  be  easy  to  make  this  fact  appear 
from  the  New  Testament.  It  is  one  of  those  points 
on  which  it  is  safe  to  say  the  Divine  Author  of  Chris- 
tianity could  not  have  left  his  creatures  in  the  dark, 
if  his  design  had  been  what  the  traditionists  affirm  it 
was. 

»  Milton's  Works,  8yo.  p.  25. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  235 

The  response  usually  made  to  this  requisition  for 
proof,  is,  that  "  the  Bible  is  so  obscure  that  it  needs 
an  authorized  interpreter,  and  that  this  interpreter 
can  only  be  ^  Catholic  antiquity,'  or  the  Church." 
That  some  parts  of  the  Bible  are  "  obscure"  both  to 
the  learned  and  the  unlearned,  will  not  be  denied;  but 
to  allege  that  it  is  obscure  as  a  whole,  or  obscure  as 
to  the  great  essential  truths  which  it  is  necessary  for 
all  to  understand  and  believe,  is  to  gainsay  its  own 
statements  and  to  cast  dishonour  upon  its  author. 
No  right-minded  person  will  refuse  to  avail  himself 
of  all  suitable  helps  within  his  reach,  in  studying  the 
sacred  volume.  He  will  humbly  seek  the  aid  of  the 
Holy  Spirit,  who  is  the  only  infallible  teacher.  He 
will  consult  commentaries,  judicious  Christians,  minis- 
ters of  the  Gospel,  and  learned  and  pious  authors,  as  he 
may  have  opportunity.  He  will  hold  in  high  esteem 
those  Creeds  and  Confessions  which  have  been  adopt- 
ed as  summaries  of  doctrine  by  evangelical  churches 
whether  in  ancient  or  modern  times.  But  all  this 
involves  no  relinquishment  of  the  right  of  private 
judgment — no  concession  that  the  Bible  is,  on  funda- 
mental points,  an  obscure  book.  Indeed,  this  charge 
against  the  Bible  is  well  nigh  ludicrous  considering  the 
source  from  whence  it  comes  and  the  sort  of  help  that 
is  tendered  us  in  threading  the  intricacies  of  Scripture. 
For  "  let  the  Scriptures  be  h^rd  ;  are  they  more  hard, 
more  crabbed,  more  abstruse,  than  the  fathers?  He 
that  cannot  understand  the  sober,  plain,  and  unaffec- 
ted style  of  the  Scriptures,  will  be  ten  times  more  puz- 
zled with  the  knotty  Africanisms,  the  pampered  meta- 
phors, the  intricate  and  involved  sentences  of  the 
fathers,  besides  the  fantastic  and  declamatory  flashes, 
the  cross-jingling  periods  which  cannot  but  disturb, 


236  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

and  come  thwart  a  settled  devotion,  worse  than  the 
din  of  bells  and  rattles."  ^ 

One  assumption  leads  to  another.  Having  assumed 
that  the  Bible  is  unintelligible  without  an  interpreter, 
High-Church  traditionists  claim  that  "  Catholic  anti- 
quity" is  the  authorized  interpreter.  This  is  the  very- 
point  to  be  proved.  The  necessity  (whether  real  or 
imaginary)  of  some  interpreter,  obviously  does  not 
justify  the  inference,  that  this  office  belongs  to  Catho- 
hc  antiquity.  The  Romanists  who  admit  the  prem- 
ises, reject  the  conclusion.  Catholic  antiquity  by 
itself  is  not  their  interpreter  of  Scripture  ;  but  Catholic 
tradition  of  all  ages,  or  rather  the  Church  itself  in  one 
age  equally  with  another.  What  we  want  of  the  tradi- 
tionist — whether  Romish,  Anglican,  or  Anglo-Ameri- 
can— is  proof  that  the  Church  has  been  constituted 
the  mierring  expositor  of  holy  writ.  That  a  Church 
should  challenge  this  prerogative  to  herself,  or  that 
indiscreet  persons  among  her  children  should  claim  it 
for  her,  is  not  proof.  The  few  scattered  texts  of 
Scripture  that  have  been  put  upon  the  rack  to  make 
them  speak  in  support  of  this  theory,  furnish  nothing 
that  deserves  to  be  dignified  with  the  name  of  proof. 
And  all  they  do  say  is  extorted  by  the  application  of 
that  principle  of  private  judgment,  which,  we  are  told, 
it  is  so  unsafe  to  rely  upon.  In  other  words,  the  tra- 
ditionist  can  only  prove  that  men  have  no  right  to 
interpret  Scripture  for  themselves,  and  that  the  Church 
is  the  duly  appointed  expositor  of  the  Bible,  by  using 
his  own  private  judgment  in  interpreting  those  texts 
he  brings  forward  as  his  proofs.  The  consistency 
and  modesty  of  this  conduct  are  worthy  of  the  system 
to  which  they  belong. 

'  Milton's  tract,  "  Of  Reformation  in  England." 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  237 

A  second  consideration  relied  upon  to  prove  the 
necessity  of  some  authoritative  expositor  of  Scripture, 
is  derived  from  the  numerous  heresies  and  divisions 
which,  it  is  alleged,  have  resulted  from  the  exercise 
of  private  judgment,  in  the  interpretation  of  the  Bible. 
There  are  various  ways  of  answering  this  argument. 
The  argumentum  ad  hoininem  will  suffice  for  the 
present.  Let  the  objector  look  at  home.  Scripture 
and  tradition,  he  maintains,  has  always  been  the 
Church's  Rule  of  Faith.  Whence,  then,  came  all  the 
heresies  and  schisms  which  agitated  and  rent  the  early 
Church?  Whence  the  "  Roman  schism?"  Whence 
the  numerous  contending  schools  and  factions  both  in 
the  Western  and  Eastern  Churches?  Whence  the 
discord  and  strife  which  now  rage  in  the  Church  of 
England  and  the  Episcopal  Church  in  this  country? 
It  were  well  for  traditionists  to  consider  these  facts, 
before  indicting  private  judgment  as  the  chief  distur- 
ber of  the  peace  of  Christendom.  That  the  abuse 
of  this  right  has  sometimes  led  to  disastrous  conse- 
quences, all  will  admit.  But  it  remains  to  be  proved 
that  religion  gains  any  thing  when  men  bandage  their 
eyes,  and  bind  themselves  to  follow  wherever  the 
Church  leads.  This  course,  if  it  were  generally  and 
implicitly  adopted,  might  preclude  excitement  and 
agitation ;  but  the  tranquilhty  it  would  produce,  would 
be  that  of  the  Dead  Sea. 

Traditionists  fail,  then,  in  making  out  the  prelimi- 
nary position,  that  the  Scriptures  require  an  authori- 
tative expounder:  much  less  can  they  estabhsh  the 
claim  of  Catholic  antiquity  or  the  early  Church  to  this 
office. 

But  let  us  come  to  the  practical  working  of  the 
proposed  Rule  of  Faith — Scrijtturt  interpreted  by 


238  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OJ' 

Catholic  antiquity,  or,  more  concisely,  Scripture 
interpreted  by  the  Church. 

The  first  question  to  be  asked  here,  is,  "  Where  and 
when  has  the  Church  spoken?"  It  is  common  to 
answer  this  question  by  repeating  the  maxim  of  Vin- 
centius  Lirinensis  ah'eady  quoted:  "Quod  semper," 
&c. — "Whatever  has  been  delivered  always,  every 
where,  and  hy  all,  is  to  be  regarded  as  the  voice  of 
the  Church."  But  although  this  is  their  own.  rule, 
nothing  could  be  more  arbitrary  and  capricious  than 
the^mode  in  which  High-Churchmen  use  it.  For 
example,  the  "  semper"  (always)  obviously  excludes 
every  doctrine  not  taught  in  the  time  of  the  Apostles; 
and  the  "  ab  omnibus,"  (by  all,)  every  doctrine  not 
taught  by  the  Apostles.  But  this  fair  and  natural 
construction  would  be  fatal  to  the  whole  scheme  of 
the  traditionists,  and  it  is  therefore  '^ot  allowed. 
Again,  they  take  the  liberty  of  rejecting  many  doc- 
trines and  usages  prevalent  in  the  early  Church, 
which  can  plead  at  least  equal  authority,  under  Vin- 
cent's rule,  with  others  which  they  recognize  as  Catho- 
lic and  binding.  Of  this  sort,  were  the  celibacy  of  the 
clergy,  the  kiss  of  charity  in  their  religious  assemblies, 
and  the  election  of  Bishops  by  the  people. 

But  allowing  the  advocates  of  the  rule  to  define  its 
terms  as  they  see  fit — to  make  the  "  always"  mean 
say  six  centuries,  and  the  "  by  all,"  the  fathers  within 
that  period — the  only  satisfactory  way  for  an  inquirer 
to  proceed,  is  to  sit  down  to  the  study  of  those  fathers 
and  make  out  a  scheme  of  the  points  in  which  they 
all  agree.  This  thorough  examination  of  from  one 
to  two  hundred  folios  in  Greek  and  Latin,  will  occupy 
the  leisure  time  of  any  man  of  business  for  the  best 
part  of  an  ordinary  life.     And  when  completed,  he 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  239 

will  have  found  a  lamp  with  which  he  can  hegin  to 
study  the  word  of  God ! 

High-Churchmen,  of  course,  represent  this  labour 
as  unnecessary.  They  would  substitute  for  it  the 
more  summary  process  of  ''hearing  the  Chiirch.^^ 
And  when  it  is  asked,  "  How  can  I  hear  the  Church?" 
the  reply  is,  "  Hear  the  Church  in  her  creeds  and  the 
decrees  of  her  four  or  six  general  councils:"  or,  more 
compendiously  still,  "  in  her  Book  of  Common  Pray- 
er." This  is  Bishop  Doane's  answer  to  the  question, 
in  his  Troy  Sermon,  (p.  23;)  and  again,  in  his  ser- 
mon at  New  Brunswick,  entitled,  "  The  Faith  once 
delivered  to  the  Saints,"  he  says,  "  To  one  and  all, 
then,  unlearned  not  less  than  learned,  we  say,  with 
admirable  Dr.  Hook,  '  in  taking  the  Prayer-Book  for 
your  guide  to  the  right  understanding  of  Scripture — 
the  whole  Prayer-Book,  Creeds,  Catechism,  Articles, 
Baptismal  office,  office  for  the  Eucharist,  office  for  the 
ordaining  of  Bishops,  Priests  and  Deacons — you  take 
for  your  guide  the  consentient  voice  of  the  universal 
primitive  Church,' — in  other  words,  ^the  faith  once 
delivered  to  the  saints.'  " 

If  this  meant  only  that  the  Episcopal  Church  re- 
gards the  Prayer-Book  as  containing  a  compend  of 
the  inspired  volume  in  respect  to  doctrine,  the  sacra- 
ments, the  ministry,  and  worship,  and  that  her  mem- 
bers ought  to  pay  great  respect  to  its  teachings  when 
they  study  the  Scriptures,  no  reasonable  person  could 
object  to  it.  Other  Churches  have  their  standards  of 
doctrine,  order,  and  worship,  to  which  they  require 
their  members  to  conform,  and  which  they  confidently 
recommend  as  summaries  of  the  teachings  of  our 
Saviour  and  the  inspired  writers.  But  more  than  this 
is  intended.     The   Prayer-Book  is  the  exponent  of 


240  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

"  Catholic  tradition.''  It  utters  "  the  consentient  voice 
of  the  universal  primitive  Church."  It  has  an  au- 
thority independent  of  Scripture,  which  it  derives 
from  Christ  through  the  Church,  and  on  the  ground 
of  which  it  is  to  be  received  as  an  essential  part  of  the 
Rule  of  Faith.  We  are  not  to  interpret  it  by  the 
Bible,  but  to  interpret  the  Bible  by  it.  The  Prayer- 
Book  is  the  primary^  the  Bible  the  secondary  source 
of  the  true  faith.  ^ 

Now  this  being  the  character  in  which  the  Prayer- 
Book  challenges  my  confidence,  I  must,  first  of  all, 
assure  myself  that  in  hearing  it,  I  "  hear  the  Church." 
That  book,  it  is  well  known,  has  not  the  sanction  of 
more  than  a  twentieth,  perhaps  not  more  that  a  fiftieth, 
part  of  Protestant  Christendom.  It  has  been  submit- 
ted to  a  small  portion  only  of  the  body  recognized  by 
High-Churchmen  as  the  Church  Catholic.  The  East- 
ern Churches  have  never  adopted  it.  The  Western 
Church  pronounces  it  heretical  in  its  Articles,  and 
declares  the  Churches  which  use  it  to  be  no  part  of  the 
true  Church.  Before  an  individual,  then,  can  acknow- 
ledge the  Prayer-Book  as  a  part  of  the  Rule  of  Faith, 
he  must  satisfy  himself  that  the  Church  of  England 
and  its  American  daughter,  are  branches  of  the  true 
Church.  This  inquiry  will  neccessarily  take  in  the 
Apostolical  Succession,  and  many  other  topics  of  no 
inconsiderable  extent  and  difficulty.  Then  he  must 
explore  Catholic  antiquity  to  see  whether  it  is  faith- 
fully reflected  in  this  volume.  If  the  entire  Prayer- 
Book  is  proposed  as  part  of  the  Rule  of  Faith,  its 
several  portions  must  all  be  verified  by  an  examina- 
tion of  the  sources  from  which  they  are  derived.  If 
this  distinction  is  claimed  for  certain  portions  of  it 

•  See  Mr.  Keble's  views  above. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  241 

^only,  the  investigation,  may  be  restricted  to  them. 
If,  again,  with  these  are  to  be  associated,  as  another 
constituent  part  of  the  Rule  of  Faith,  the  decrees  of 
some  four  or  six  general  councils,  the  history  of  those 
councils  must  be  explored,  to  ascertain  whether  they 
were  general  comic 'i\Sy  and  therefore  of  binding  obli- 
gation. These  points  being  settled,  (6y  private  judg- 
ment,) the  next  thing  is  to  ascertain  the  meaning  of 
the  documents  in  question.  How  is  this  to  be  done? 
If  it  be  said,  "every  individual  must  do  it  for  himself, 
with  the  best  helps  he  can  get;"  this  is  a  very  sen- 
sible and  adequate  answer,  but  it  throws  men  upon 
their  private  judgment,  which  it  is  a  radical  object 
with  this  system  to  avoid.  Besides,  if  men  may  use 
their  private  judgment  in  interpreting  creeds  and 
synodical  decrees  which  are  to  govern  them  in  their 
study  of  the  Bible,  this  is  all  one  with  their  using  it 
in  interpreting  the  Bible  itself  A  consistent  High- 
Churchman  will,  on  this  ground,  refer  us  to  the 
Church  again  for  the  true  exposition  of  these  docu- 
ments. This  however,  will  not  mend  the  matter. 
For  where  or  when  has  the  Church  given  the  re- 
quired exposition?  We  have  conceded  (for  argu- 
ment's sake)  that  she  has  spoken  in  these  formularies 
and  decrees — that  they  are  the  voice  of  the  Church 
Catholic.  But  where  is  her  commentary  on  them? 
To  refer  for  it  to  the  annals  of  her  councils,  is  to  point 
us  to  the  very  parchments  which  require  an  annotator. 
To  bid  us  seek  her  meaning  in  the  consentient  writings 
of  her  eminent  doctors,  is  to  put  us  upon  a  twenty 
years  chase  of  an  ignis  fa  tuns.  To  direct  us  to  the 
Bishop  or  Pastor  on  whose  ministrations  we  attend, 
is  to  substitute  an  individual  for  the  Church — one 

21 


242  THE    HIGH-CIIURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

fallible  man  like  ourselves,  for  infallible  Catholic  an- 
tiquity. . 

The  difficulty  does  not  end  here.  Suppose  the 
inquirer  could  find,  it  matters  not  where,  a  minute 
exposition  of  the  creeds  and  the  oecumenical  decrees, 
stamped  with  the  broad  and  indubitable  impress  of 
the  universal  Church;  that  exposition  would  need 
an  interpreter  as  much  as  the  documents  it  professed 
to  explain.  He  could  no  more  be  allowed  to  inter- 
pret the  comment  for  himself  than  the  text.  And  if 
he  could  get  an  authoritative  exposition  of  that  com- 
ment, this  would  leave  him  in  the  same  predicament 
still.  And  thus  exposition  might  be  piled  upon  ex- 
position, and  comment  upon  comment,  without  help- 
ing him  forward  a  single  step  in  his  search  after 
"  Catholic  truth."  Absurd  as  these  consequences  are, 
they  are  the  legitimate  fruit  of  the  doctrine  which 
denies  the  right  of  private  judgment,  and  makes  the 
Church  the  only  authorized  expounder  of  the  sacred 
oracles. 

It  is  usual  for  High-Churchrnen  to  say  in  reply 
to  this  view,  that  for  all  practical  purposes  a  man 
"  hears  the  Church"  when  he  hears  his  own  minister. 
There  can  be  no  doubt  that  people  are  in  the  habit 
of  receiving  a  great  many  things  as  true,  simply  on 
the  word  of  their  pastors.  Nor  is  any  great  evil 
likely  to  ensue  from  this  practice  so  long  as  their  pas- 
tors constantly  refer  them  to  the  Bible,  and  urge  them 
to  search  the  Scriptures  whether  the  doctrines  they 
inculcate  be  really  so.  But  the  case  is  widely  different 
when  *'  Catholic  tradition"  is  placed  above  the  Bible 
and  made  essential  to  a  right  interpretation  of  it,  and 
people  are  admonished  that  "  when  the  sense  of 
Scripture  as  interpreted  by  reason  is  contrary  to  the 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  243 

sense  given  to  it  by  Catholic  antiquity,  [or  by  the 
Church]  they  ought  to  side  with  the  latter."  In  these 
circumstances,  it  becomes  a  question  of  paramount 
importance  with  every  man,  whether  his  minister  is 
one  that  is  empowered  to  speak  for  Catholic  antiqui- 
ty, that  is,  whether  he  is  a  true  minister  of  the  true 
Church.  Suppose,  for  example,  the  question,  to  be 
asked  is  this:  "  What  is  the  doctrine  of  the  Church 
on  the  subject  of  justification?"  Admitting  the  maxim 
that  when  a  man  hears  his  minister  he  hears  the 
Church,  the  Church  would  give  different  and  conflict- 
ing answers  to  this  question,  according  as  the  inquirer 
might  happen  to  belong  to  the  Romish,  the  Greek,  or 
one  or  the  other  division — High-Church  or  Evangeli- 
cal— of  the  Episcopal  Church,  i  All  but  one  of  these 
responses  must  be  wrong— that  is,  allowing  that  the 
Church  Catholic  has,  as  such,  as  all  traditionists 
assert,  taught  any  thing  on  the  subject.  It  cannot, 
therefore,  be  the  duty  of  any  man  to  yield  an  implicit 
faith  to  the  teachings  of  his  own  minister  as  the  oracle 
of  the  Church.  He  must  assure  himself  of  the  Apos- 
tolic lineage  of  his  pastor,  and  of  the  right  of  the 
church  to  which  he  belongs  to  be  regarded  as  a 
genuine  branch  of  the  Church  universal.  This  will 
require  no  little  time  and  study,  and  no  small  exercise 
of  private  judgment.  These  difficulties  being  cleared 
up,  what  has  he  learned  when  his  pastor  has  told 
him  what  the  Church  teaches  on  any  given  point — 
say  justification?  Why  simply  how  his  pastor,  in 
the  exercise  of  his  private  judgment,  understands  the 
decrees  or  articles  of  the  Church  relating  to  justifica- 

1  It  has  been  shrewdly  and  justly  said  in  a  very  able  pamphlet 
published  a  year  or  so  ago,  that  "  the  Bible  means  one  thing  in  iVeio 
Jersey,  and  a  far  dili'crent  thing  in  Ohio.^^-r-  Oxford  Divinity,  p.  46. 


244  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

tion.  This  answer  or  exposition,  he,  again,  under- 
stands accordina:  to  the  construction  put  upon  it  by 
his  private  judgment.  Another  pastor  might,  it  is 
obvious,  understand  the  Church  differently;  and  an- 
other auditor  (or  reader)  might  understand  the  reply 
of  his  pastor  differently.  In  all  these  details,  the  right 
of  private  judgment  miisthQ  and  is  recognized.  How 
ineffably  absurd,  then,  is  it  to  thrust  in  the  Church 
between  man  and  the  Bible,  under  the  pretence  that 
it  is  dangerous  to  allow  the  exercise  of  private  judg- 
ment upon  the  Scriptures,  and  that  this  scheme  super- 
sedes the  necessity  of  it. 

To  sum  up,  then,  in  a  few  words  what  I  have  to 
say  further  upon  this  subject, — 

1.  The  High-Church  doctrine  of  the  Rule  of  Faith 
impeaches  the  perfection  and  sufficiency  of  the  Scrip- 
tures.— It  would  be  superfluous  to  cite  specific  texts 
to  prove  that  the  Bible  claims  these  attributes  for 
itself;  1  and  equally  superfluous,  after  what  has  been 
said,  to  show  in  what  way  this  doctrine  discards  the 
claim.  .    . 

2.  This  doctrine  is  in  conflict  with  the  explicit  teach- 
ing of  the  word  of  God.  To  name  but  two  pas- 
sages: The  Bereans  are  commended  for  bringing  the 
doctrines  of  Paul  himself  to  the  test  of  Scripture. 
And  this  eminent  Apostle  says  to  the  Galatians, 
"  Though  we  or  an  angel  from  heaven  preach  any 
other  gospel  unto  you  than  that  which  we  have 
preached  unto  you,  let  him  be  accursed."  We  are 
here  instructed  to  try  every  doctrine,  by  whomsoever 
preached,  by  the  written  Scriptures.  Even  if  an 
angel  should  come  to  us  with  a  message  at  variance 
w4lh  the  revelation  we  have,  it  would  be  our  duty  to 

•  See  Psalms  xix.  and  cxlx. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  245 

reject  him. — Such  an  admonition  could  never  have 
been  uttered,  and  it  can  never  be  consistently  acted 
upon,  by  one  who  holds  that  Scripture  and  tradition — 
Scripture  interpreted  by  the  Church — constitutes  the 
Rule  of  Faith. 

3.  This  doctrine  is  at  variance  with  the  XXXIX 
Articles  of  the  Episcopal  Church. — Thus  Article  VI. 
says:  "Holy  Scripture  containeth  all  things  necessary 
to  salvation:  so  that  whatsoever  is  not  read  therei|4, 
nor  may  be  proved  thereby,  is  not  to  be  required  of 
any  man,  that  it  should  be  believed  as  an  article  of 
faith,  or  be  thought  requisite  or  necessary  to  salva- 
tion.'' 

And  Art.  VIII.— "The  Nicene  Creed,  and  that 
which  is  commonly  called  the  Apostles'  Creed  ought 
thoroughly  to  be  received  and  believed :  for  they  may 
be  proved  by  most  certain  warrants  of  holy  Scrip- 
ture." The  men  who  framed  these  Articles  had  no 
idea  of  enthroning  the  creeds  above  Prophets  and 
Apostles.  Instead  of  directing  that  the  Bible  shall  be 
interpreted  by  the  Creeds,  they  say  the  Creeds  are  to 
be  received  "  because  they  may  be  proved  by  Holy 
Scripture." 

4.  The  proposed  rule  of  faith  is  beyond  the  reach 
of  the  great  mass  of  mankind,  unless  indeed  they  are 
willing  to  trust  to  the  infallibility  of  their  own  minis- 
ter or  priest:  and  it  eludes  none  of  the  alleged  evils 
which  are  charged  upon  the  exercise  of  private  judg- 
ment in  the  interpretation  of  Scripture.  For  if  men 
examine  the  "  traditions"  of  the  Church  for  them- 
selves, they  must  interpret  them  according  to  their 
private  judgment;  and  if  they  rely  upon  the  declara- 
tion of  a  priest  as  to  their  import,  they  receive  only 

21* 


246  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

the  interpretation  put  upon  them  by  his  private  judg- 
ment. 

5.  The  theory  assumes  that  the  Church  cannot  err; 
and  that  it  is  always  safe  for  an  individual  to  follow 
the  voice  of  the  Church  Catholic  as  expressed  by  the 
great  body  of  her  lawful  governors.  Have  the  rulers 
of  the  Christian  Church  ever  been  more  united  on 
any  question,  than  the  rulers  of  the  Jewish  Church 
A^jere  in  pronouncing  the  Son  of  God  an  impostor  ?  It 
was  the  voice  of  the  Church  which  shouted  "  Crucify 
him !"  "  Crucify  him !"  Was  the  voice  of  the  Church 
then  of  equal  authority  with  the  Scriptures  as  a  part 
of  the  Rule  of  Faith? 

Again,  during  a  part  of  the  fourth  century,  as  was 
stated  in  the  last  chapter,  Arianism  was  the  avowed 
faith,  not  of  a  few  individuals  merely,  but  of  the 
Church  Catholic.  "  The  poison  of  the  Arians,"  says 
Vincentius  Lirinensis,  "had  not  only  infected  one 
part  but  almost  all  the  world;  and  almost  all  the 
Latin  Bishops,  some  by  force,  others  by  simplicity 
giving  themselves  over  to  be  deceived,  found  them- 
selves engaged  in  the  darkness  of  error.'^  "We  are 
in  that  condition,"  says  Phaebadius,  "  that  if  we 
would  be  called  Catholics,  it  is  necessary  that  we  em- 
brace heresy :  and  yet  nevertheless  if  we  do  not  re- 
ject heresy,  we  cannot  be  truly  Catholics."  The 
sentiments  of  Arius  were  adopted  by  several  succes- 
sive councils,  both  in  the  East  and  the  West ;  and. 
the  few  orthodox  Bishops  and  Presbyters  who  re- 
fused to  conform,  were  persecuted.  Was  it  the,  duty 
of  an  inquirer,  in  these  circumstances,  to  "  hear  the 
Church  ?"  And  was  the  Church's  creed  and  synodi- 
cal  decrees,  the   standard   by  which  all  men  were 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  247 

bound  to  interpret  the  Scriptures  ?  It  may  be  said 
that  these  consequences  will  not  follow,  because  Ari- 
anism  was  estabUshed  only  for  a  short  period,  and 
does  not  therefore  come  within  the  "  quod  semjier^^ 
the  "  always,"  of  Vincent's  rule,  which  is  essential  to 
prove  anything  a  tenet  of  the  universal  Church.  I 
answer,  (1.)  that  the  example  at  least  shows  the 
danger  of  trusting  implicitly  to  the  teaching  of  the 
Church:  and  (2.)  that  if  the  want  of  the  "quod  sem- 
per" precludes  the  recognition  of  Arianism  as  part  of 
the  Church's  creed,  the  fact  that  it  was  a  part  of  its 
creed  for  the  j^eriod  in  question,  obviously  excludes 
the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  from  its  creed  on  the  same 
ground.  For  if  "Catholic  tradition"  embraces  only 
those  points  which  the  Church  has  "  always^ ^  taught, 
it  cannot,  of  course,  include  those  which  were  rejected 
during  the  prevalence  of  the  Arian  heresy. 

It  should  be  added,  to  prevent  misapprehension, 
that  the  word  "  Church"  is  used  in  this  argument  in 
the  sense  of  those  whose  views  I  am  controverting, 
as  denoting  only  the  visible  Church.  It  is  superfluous 
to  say  that  Christ  has  always  had  a  chosen  and  sanc- 
tified people  in  the  world — his  true,  spiritual  Church 
— who  have  remained  steadfast  through  all  the  fluc- 
tuations and  heresies  of  the  visible  Church,  and  who 
have  never  denied  the  Trinity  nor  any  other  essential 
doctrine  of  the  Scriptures. 

6.  The  only  remaining  observation  which  it  seems 
worth  while  to  make  on  this  subject,  is,  that  when- 
ever tradition  is  associated  with  the  Bible  as  the  rule 
of  faith,  the  inevitable  tendency  is  to  expand  tradition 
until  it  overshadows  and  nullifies  the  Bible.  It  was 
thus  with  the  Pharisees  :  they  "  made  the  command- 
ment of  God  of  none  efl'ect  by  their  tradition."     It  is 


248  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

thus  with  the  Romanists  :  the  Bible  is,  to  use  a  coarse 
but  expressive  figure,  a  mere  "  nose  of  wax"  in  the 
Papal  system.  It  is  hazarding  httle  to  predict,  that  it 
will  be  so  also  with  the  High-Church  school.  Indeed, 
there  are  decisive  indications  of  ^'  progress"  among 
them  already  in  this  direction.  What  they  now  call 
"  Catholic  antiquity,"  as  adumbrated  in  the  Prayer- 
Book,  will*  not,  probably,  long  satisfy  them.  Their 
principles  demand  as  extended  and  flexible  a  rule  of 
faith,  as  Rome  herself  has ;  and  having  begun  with 
"tradition,"  there  seems  no  good  reason  why  they 
should  stop  where  they  are.  King  James  II.  told 
Bishop  Burnet,  that  the  reason  of  his  turning  Papist 
was,  that  hearing  so  much  from  the  English  divines 
about  "  the  authority  of  the  Church,  and  of  the  tradi- 
tion from  the  Apostles  in  support  of  Episcopacy,"  he 
considered  that  other  traditions  might  be  taken  on  the 
word  of  the  Catholic  Church,  as  well  as  Episcopacy 
on  the  word  of  the  English,  and  he  therefore  thought 
it  "reasonable  to  go  over  to  the  Church  of  Rome." 
Many  of  the  Puseyite  Episcopalians  of  our  day  have 
reasoned  as  James  did  and  followed  his  example. 
Rome  sees  her  advantage  and  makes  good  use  of  it. 
It  remains  to  be  proved  whether  the  High-Church 
party  will  be  able  to  cope  with  her,  without  borrow- 
ing those  "other  traditions"  which  she  wields  so 
effectively  against  them. 


THE    ArOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  249 


CHAPTER  VIII. 


I  INSERTED  in  the  last  chapter,  an  outUne  of  the 
High-Church  system,  from  the  pen  of  the  late  Dr. 
Arnold.  To  obtain  an  accurate  idea  of  the  system, 
it  is  necessary  to  pay  particular  attention  to  the  views 
it  inculcates  respecting  the  nature  of  the  Church  and 
the  Sacraments.  On  this  subject  I  shall  now  make 
a  few  observations,  with  a  view  of  showing  that  this 
scheme  puts  the  Church  and  the  ministry  in  the 
PLACE  OF  Christ. 

On  opening  the  New  Testament  we  find  it  every 
where  addressing  men  as  individuals.  It  tells  them 
that  they  are  "by  nature  the  children  of  wrath," 
"dead  in  trespasses  and  in  sins."  It  declares  that 
"  except  a  man  be  born  again,  he  cannot  see  the  king- 
dom of  God."  It  warns  them  not  to  trust  in  names 
and  privileges :  "  In  Christ  Jesus  neither  circumcision 
availeth  any  thing  nor  uncircumcision,  but  a  new 
creature."  It  says  to  them,  "  Except  ye  repent,  ye 
shall  all  likewise  perish."  "Believe  on  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ,  and  thou  shalt  be  saved."  "  If  any  man 
be  in  Christ,  he  is  a  new  creature."  It  affirms  that 
Jesus  Christ  is  the  only  Mediator  between  God  and 
men ;  and  invites  all  men  to  approach  God  in  his 
name,  and  supplicate  the  blessings  they  need.  The 
Saviour,  addressing  the  whole  human  family,  says, 
"Come  unto  me,  all  ye  that  labour,  and  are  heavy 
laden,  and  I  will  give  you  rest."     "  Him  that  cometh 


250  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

unto  me  I  will  in  no  wise  cast  out.'^  He  is  the  source 
of  grace  to  his  people.  They  are  individually  and 
directly  united  to  Him  as  the  branches  to  the  vine, 
as  the  members  to  the  Head.  They  receive  and 
abide  in  Him  by  faith,  and  He  abides  in  them  by  the 
influences  of  His  Spirit.  The  consummation  of  this 
union  between  Christ  and  themselves,  makes  them 
members  of  "  his  body,  the  Church,^\ — that  is,  the 
true  Church,  that  Church  which  is  styled  "  the  Gene- 
ral Assembly  and  Church  of  the  First-born,  which  are 
written  in  heaven,"  and  which  is  intended  in  such 
passages  as  these:  "That  in  the  dispensation  of  the 
fulness  of  times,  he  might  gather  together  in  one  all 
things  in  Christ,  both  which  are  in  heaven,  and  which 
are  on  earth,  even  in  him. — And  hath  put  all  things 
under  his  feet,  and  gave  him  to  be  the  head  over  all 
things  to  the  Church,  which  is  his  body,  the  fulness 
of  him  that  fiUeth  all  in  all."  (Eph.  i.  10,  22,  23.) 
This  Church  is  one.  Its  members  being  all  "  one  in 
Christ  Jesus,"  and  united  to  him  as  their  common 
Head,  are  one  with  each  other.  They  may  be  widely 
separated  on  earth;  they  may  belong  to  rival  and 
even  hostile  ecclesiastical  societies;  but  they  are  chil- 
dren of  the  same  Almighty  Parent,  and  "by  one  spirit 
they  have  all  been  baptized  into  one  body."  A 
Church  thus  constituted,  must  possess  the  attribute  of 
Unity.  Another  of  its  attributes  is  Sanctity.  One 
portion  of  its  members,  those  in  glory,  are  perfectly 
holy;  the  remaining  portion  are  all  regenerated  and 
partially  sanctified.  This  Church,  again,  is  Catholic. 
All  renewed  persons  belong  to  it,  wherever  they  may 
live,  or  with  whatever  communion  they  may  be  con- 
nected. The  Church  thus  constituted  is  invisible;  that 
is,  it  is  invisible  to  us  as  a  Church.     "The  Lord 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  251 

knoweth  them  that  are  His.'^     And  the  individuals 
embraced  in  his  Church,  are  of  course,  as  individuals, 
visible  to  their  fellow-creatures.     But  they  are  not 
associated  in  any  organized  body  which  is  cognizable 
to  our  senses.     They  live, in  different  lands;  some  of 
them,  indeed,  dwell  in  the  Saviour's  presence.     They 
never  meet  in  one  place.     They  belong  to  different 
communions,  some  of  which  may,  as  religious  socie- 
ties, have  become  heretical  and  apostate.     While  the 
true  Church  of  Christ,  therefore,  is  one,  it  is,  as  a 
Church,  invisible.^      It   is  obvious  that  out  of  this 
Church  there  is  no  salvation.     Mark  the  distinction 
here.     It  is  not  said  that  out  of  this  or  that  particular 
visible  Church,  there  is  no  salvation :  that  is  one  of 
the  arrogant  assumptions  of  the  High-Church  school. 
We  find  not  one  word  in  the  Scriptures  to  authorize 
the  dogma  that  salvation  is  restricted  to  the  Presbyte- 
rian Church,  or  the  Episcopal  Church,  or  the  Romish 
Church,  or  the  Greek  Church,  or  any  other  branch  of 
the  visible  Church.     But  we  find  ample  warrant  there 
for  asserting  that  salvation  is  confined  to  the  true, 
spiritual,  invisible  Church  of  Christ;  for  that  Church 
embraces  all  truly  regenerated  persons.    The  moment 
a  sinner  receives  Christ  as  his  Saviour  with  a  cordial 
faith  —  the   moment   he  experiences  the  renovating 
power  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  is  made  a  ^'new  crea- 
ture in  Christ  Jesus" — that  moment  he  is  introduced 
into  this  Church.     It  matters  not  what  his  external 
relations  may  be,  or  what  sectarian   name  he  may 
bear.     It  is  all  one,  as  to  the  point  in  hand,  whether 

'  See  on  this  whole  subject,  a  very  able  "  Treatise  on  the  Church," 
by  the  Rev.  Thomas  Jackson,  D.  D.,  who  is  commended  by  Dr.  Pusey 
as  "one  of  the  best  and  greatest  minds  our  [the  English]  Church  has 
nurtured."     Philad.  1844. 


252  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

he  be  an  Episcopalian  or  a  Baptist,  a  Romanist  or  a 
Quaker,  a  Hindoo  or  a  Mahometan ;  if  he  truly  repents 
of  his  sins,  and  with  his  heart  believes  in  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ,  he  is  thereby  made  a  member  of  his 
mystical  body.  This  union  with  Christ,  the  Bible 
affirms  to  be  the  only  way  of  salvation.  We  state  a 
very  familiar  Scripture  truth,  then,  when  we  say  that 
out  of  that  Church  which  comprises  all  genuine  be- 
hevers,  there  is  no  salvation. 

One  of  the  radical  errors  of  the  High-Church  sys- 
tem, is,  that  it  confounds  or  denies  the  distinction  be- 
tv/een  the  invisible  Church — the  true,  spiritual  Church 
of  Christ — and  the  visible  Church.  The  sacred  wri- 
ters frequently  apply  the  word  "  Church"  to  socie- 
ties of  professing  Christians,  as  when  they  say  "  the 
Church  of  Ephesus,"  "the  Church  at  Corinth,'-'  and 
the  like.  It  is  common  to  speak  of  the  aggregate  of 
those  societies  which  profess  the  true  religion  as 
"  the  visible  Church."  Thus  the  Westminster  Con- 
fession of  Faith,  chapter  xxv.  section  2 :  "  The  visi- 
ble Church,  which  is  also  Catholic  or  universal  under 
the  Gospel,  (not  confined  to  one  nation  as  before 
under  the  law,)  consists  of  all  those  throughout  the 
world,  that  profess  the  true  religion,  together  with 
their  children  ;  and  is  the  kingdom  of  the  Lord  Jesus 
Christ,  the  house  and  family  of  God,  out  of  which 
there  is  no  ordinary  possibility  of  salvation."  I  sub- 
join the  remaining  sections. 

HI.  "Unto  this  Catholic  visible  Church,  Christ 
hath  given  the  ministry,  oracles,  and  ordinances  of 
God,  for  the  gathering  and  perfecting  of  the  saints,  in 
this  life,  to  the  end  of  the  world;  and  doth  by  his 
own  presence  and  Spirit,  according  to  his  promise, 
make  them  effectual  thereunto. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  253 

IV.  "This  Catholic  Church  hath  been  sometimes 
more,  sometimes  less,  visible.  And  particular  church- 
es, which  are  members  thereof,  are  more  or  less  pure, 
according  as  the  doctrine  of  the  Gospel  is  taught  and 
embraced,  ordinances  administered,  and  public  wor- 
ship performed  more  or  less  purely  in  them. 

V.  "The  purest  churches  under  heaven  are  sub- 
ject both  to  mixture  and  error:  and  some  have  so 
degenerated  as  to  become-  no  churches  of  Christ  but 
synagogues  of  Satan.  Nevertheless,  there  shall  be 
always  a  Church  on  earth  to  worship  God  according 
to  his  will. 

VI.  "  There  is  no  other  Head  of  the  Church  but 
the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.  Nor  can  the  Pope  of  Rome 
in  any  sense  be  head  thereof;  but  is  that  anti-christ, 
that  man  of  sin,  and  son  of  perdition,  that  exalteth 
himself  in  the  Church  against  Christ  -and  all  that  is 
called  God.'' 

A  single  clause  in  this  chapter  has  been  sometimes 
quoted  with  a  view  of  producing  the  impression  that 
the  Presbyterian  Church  arrogates  to  herself  an  exclu- 
sive salvation — viz.  the  clause  which  affirms  that  out 
of  this  visible  Church  "there  is  no  ordinary  possibility 
of  salvation."  If  by  the  "  visible  Church'^  in  this 
connexion,  were  intended  the  Presbyterian  Church 
merely,  there  might  be  some  ground  for  this  imputa- 
tion. But  the  context  explicitly  states  that  the  phrase 
includes  "  all  those  throughout  the  world  who  profess 
the  true  religion.^ ^  And  the  whole  history  of  the 
Presbyterian  Church  shows  that  she  regards  all  other 
evangelical  churches  as  sister -churches,  and  as  consti- 
tuting part  of  "the  visible  Church."  That  salvation 
is  "  ordinarihf  (and  this  is  all  that  is  affirmed) 
restricted  tq  the  visible   Church,  considered  in  this 


254  TPIE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

extended  sense,  will  not  probably  be  denied  by  any 
enlightened  believer  in  Christianity. 

It  is  also  asserted  in  the  chapter  quoted  from  the 
Confession  of  Faith,  that  to  the  visible  Church  "Christ 
hath  given  the  ministry,  oracles,  and  ordinances  of 
God;"  "but  it  is  not  taught  that  this  ministry  can 
consist  only  of  Presbyters,  ordained  by  a  Presbyte- 
rian church;  or  that  these  ordinances  can  be  validly 
administered  only  by  such  and  after  the  manner 
prescribed  in  our  form  of  worship.  On  the  contrary, 
it  is  most  explicitly  taught,  in  the  very  next  chapter 
of  our  book,  that  ^  all  saints  that  are  united  to  Jesus 
Christ,  their  Head,  by  his  Spirit  and  by  faith  .  .  .  have 
communion  in  each  other's  gifts  and  graces,  .  .  .  are 
bound  to  maintain  an  holy  fellowship  and  communion 
in  the  worship  of  God,  and  in  performing  such  other 
spiritual  services  as  tend  to  their  mutual  edification, 
.  .  .  which  communion,  as  God  offereth  opportunity, 
is  to  be  extended  unto  all  those  who,  in  every  place, 
call  upon  the  name  of  the  Lord  Jesus.'  "i 

The  inhiatory  rite  of  the  visible  society,  or,  to  speak 
more  accurately,  the  collection  of  societies  thus  consti- 
tuted, is  baptism;  which  is  administered  to  adults  on 
their  professing  faith  in  the  Redeemer,  and  subjection 
to  his  authority.  The  only  other  sacrament  instituted 
by  the  Saviour  in  his  Church,  is  the  Lord's  Supper, 
which  is  not  a  sacrifice,  but  simply  an  ordinance 
commemorative  of  Himself: — "  This  do  in  remem- 
brance of  me."  "  As  often  as  ye  eat  this  bread  and 
drink  this  cup,  ye  do  show  the  LorcVs  death  till  he 
come."  The  chief  oversight  of  this  Church  is  com- 
mitted, not  to  a  Priesthood,  but  to  a  Ministiy,  whose 

1  See  this  subject  treated  at  length  in  Dr.  Smyth's  interesting 
work  on  "  Ecclesiastical  Republicanism,"  ch.  5, 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  255 

authority  is,  as  its^  designation  imports,  merely  minis- 
terial and  declarative.  The  preaching  of  the  Gospel 
is  the  principal  instrumentality  which  God  employs 
in  converting  men  from  sin  to  holiness.  The  sacra- 
ments also  are  "means  of  grace,^'  but  their  efficacy, 
like  that  of  the  ministration  of  the  word,  depends 
wholly  upon  the  work  of  the  Spirit,  and  is  only  pro- 
mised to  those  who  worthily  participate  in  them. 
The  visible  Church  has  always  been  more  or  less 
defiled  with  error  and  sin.  It  includes  many  "  par- 
ticular churches  which  are  more  or  less  pure,*'  and  a 
mixture  of  sound  and  unsound  professors,  who  are 
for  wise  purposes  permitted  to  remain  together  until 
that  great  harvest  when  the  tares  and  the  wheat  shall 
be  separated.  Of  course  a  union  with  this  Church 
does  not  necessarily  import  a  spiritual  union  with 
Christ;  although  to  those  of  its  members  who  are 
united  to  Christ,  its  ordinances  are,  through  his  bles- 
sing, means  of  edification  and  comfort. 

These  are  substantially  the  views  of  the  Reformed 
Churches  generally  on  this  important  subject.  I  shall 
now  present  a  sketch  of  the  High-Church  doctrine. 

According  to  this  doctrine,  all  that  the  Scriptures 
say  respecting  the  true,  spiritual  Church  of  Christ, 
appertains'  ta-the  visible  Church.  This  Church  is  a 
Hierarchy.  It  consists  of  a  single  society  (now,  un- 
happily, in  a  somewhat  divided  state,)  placed  under 
the  government  of  Prelates  who  derive  their  authority 
from  its  Divine  Founder  through  an  unbroken  Pre- 
latical  succession.  These  Prelates,  indeed,  with  the 
inferior  clergy,  properly  constitute  the  Church — the 
people  being  a  mere  appendage  to  the  ministry.  To 
this  Church  are  confided  the  gifts  of  salvation.  It 
stands  in  the  place  and  is  clothed  with  the,  authority 


256  THE    HIGH-CHURCII    DOCTRINE    OP 

of  Christ,  as  his  Vicar.  It  is  the  storehouse  of  grace — 
the  only  source  from  which  grace  can  be  obtained — 
the  only  avenue  by  which  a  sinner  can  approach 
God.  This  grace  it  communicates  through  the  sacra- 
ments. In  baptism  sinners  are  born  again  or  regene- 
rated, and  by  the  Eucharist,  in  which  the  communi- 
cant partakes  of  the  "real  body  and  blood"  of  the 
Redeemer,  the  spiritual  life  communicated  in  the 
former  sacrament,  is  mainly  nourished  and  invigo- 
rated. Non-Prelatical  societies  form  no  part  of  the 
Church;  but  are  schismatical  organizations.  Nor  can 
any  one  who  refuses  submission  to  Episcopal  au- 
thority, reasonably  conclude  that  he  is  in  the  way  of 
salvation. 

Now  if  this  be  a  faithful  outline  of  the  High-Church 
system  (and  whether  it  be  or  not,  will  be  seen  pre- 
sently,) it  will  not  require  much  argument  to  prove 
that  its  whole  tendency  must  be  to  substitute  a  de- 
lusive Hierarchism  for  the  Gospel  of  Christ.  By 
Hierarchism  is  meant  a  religion  of  which  the  Priest 
is  the  centre;  a  religion  which  interposes  the  priest 
and  the  Church  between  God  and  the  sinner;  which 
encourages  the  feeling  that  there  can  be  no  access  to 
God  except  through  sacerdotal  officers' and  sacerdotal 
rites;  which  impairs  the  sense  of  personal  responsi- 
bility and  leads  men  gradually  to  commit  the  whole 
business  of  their  salvation  into  the  hands  of  the  minis- 
ter under  whose  care  Providence  may  have  placed 
them. 

The  allegation  that  they  put  the  Church  in  the 
place  of  Christ,  and  exalt  matters  of  organization  to 
an  equality  with  the  graces  and  duties  of  the  Christian 
life,  and  thus  divert  the  minds  of  men  from  the  sub- 
stance to  the  form  of  Christianity,  is  frequently  re- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  257 

pelled  by  High-Churchmen  as  an  aspersion.  But 
with  what  propriety?  Their  doctrine  is  that  an  un- 
broken Prelatical  Succession  from  the  Apostles  down, 
is  essential  to  the  very  being  of  a  Church — that  where 
such  a  succession  is  wanting,  there  is  no  ministry,  no 
sacraments,  no  authorized  preaching  of  the  word,  no 
fellowship  with  the  Church,  no  covenanted  hope  of 
salvation.  They  will  not  allow  that  this  defect  can  be 
counterbalanced  by  any  apparent  orthodoxy  of  doc- 
trine or  holiness  of  life ;  while  they  maintain  that 
wherever  this  succession  exists,  even  though  it  be  as- 
sociated with  gross  errors  and  corruptions,  it  marks  a 
true  Church.  What  is  this  but  to  elevate  Church- 
government  not  merely  to  a  level  with  vital  godliness 
but  above  it?  to  put  the  form  above  the  substance ? 

The  Oxford  Tract  writers  deny  this  consequence, 
though  they  admit  the  premises.  They  contend  that 
the  Apostolical  Succession  belongs  to  '^  the  substance" 
of  Christianity.  "To  be  admitted  within  the  myste- 
rious precincts  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven,  to  be 
miraculously  blessed  ajid  miraculously  fed  with  the 
bread  that  came  dov\rn  from  heaven,  these  are  surely 
something  more  than  forms  and  externals ;  and  the 
Episcopacy  that  has  (if  indeed  it  has)  preserved  them 
to  us,  is  something  more  than  a  matter  of  bare  dis- 
cipline, observed  in  conformity  to  Apostolical  practice. 
According  to  this  view  of  the  subject,  to  dispense 
with  Episcopal  ordination  is  to  be  regarded  not  as  a 
breach  of  order  merely  or  a  deviation  from  Apos- 
tolical precedent,  but  as  a  surrender  of  the  Christian 
priesthood,  a  rejection  of  all  the  powers  which  Christ 
instituted  Episcopacy  to  perpetuate;  and  the  attempt 
to  substitute  any  other  form  of  ordination  for  it,  or  to 
seek  commxinion  with  Christ  through  any  JN^on-Epis- 

22^^ 


258  THE    HIGH-CIIURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

copal  association,  is  to  be  regarded,  not  as  a  schism 
merely,  but  as  an  impossibility.^^  ^ 

With  this  view  agree  the  leading  Tractators.  Mr. 
Perceval,  one  of  their  number,  in  specifying  the  points 
agreed  upon  at  one  of  their  early  conferences,  as 
suitable  "to  be  put  forward  by  them,"  mentions  as 
the  first — "  The  doctrine  of  Apostolic  Succession  as  a 
rule  of  practice;  that  is,  (1.)  That  the  participation  of 
the  body  and  blood  of  Christ  is  essential  to  the  main- 
tenance of  Christian  life  and  hope  in  each  individual. 
(2.)  That  it  is  conveyed  to  individual  Christians  only 
by  the  hands  of  the  successors  of  the  Apostles-  and 
their  delegates.  (3.)  That  the  successors  of  the  Apos- 
tles are  those  who  are  descended  in  a  direct  line  from 
them  by  the  imposition  of  hands;  and  that  the  dele- 
gates of  these  are  the  respective  Presbyters  whom 
each  has  commissioned." ^  According  to  this  state- 
ment, communion  with  a  Prelatical  Church  is  '•  essen- 
tial to  the  maintenance  of  the  Christian  life  and 
hope:"  in  other  words,  true  piety  cannot  be  kept  alive 
except  in  Episcopal  Churches: — and  this  is  given  as 
the  unanimous  judgment  of  the  Tractators.  Is  there  no 
evidence  here  that  the  system  puts  order  above  doc- 
trine, and  interposes  a  priest  between  man  and  his 
God  as  the  exclusive  medium  of  salvation? 

We  are  not,  however,  left  to  mere  inferences  on 
this  point.  The  doctrine  is  explicitly  maintained 
that  the  Visibue  Church,  in  its  officers,  is  the  repre- 
sentative and  vicar  of  Christ,  and  can,  in  his  absence, 
exercise  the  functions  which  belong  to  Him  as  the 
King  and  Head  of  Zion.      The    British  Critic,   one 

1  Froude's  Remains,  edited  by  Messrs.  Keblc  and  Newman,  Vol. 
III.  p.  43. 

2  Appendix  to  Percevars  Letter  to  Dr.  Arnold. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSiON.  259 

of  the  accredited  organs  of  the  school,  and  which,  at 
the  date  of  the  number  from  which  I  am  about  to 
quote,  was  circulating  in  this  country  under  the  offi- 
cial and  emphatic  recommendation  of  one  of  the 
Bishops  1  of  the  Episcopal  Church,  is  my  authority 
for  this  statement. 

*'The  essence  of  the  doctrine  of  the  one  only  Ca- 
tholic and  Apostolic  Church,  lies  in  this — that  it  is 
the  representative  of  our  absent  Lord,  or  a  some- 
thing divinely  interposed  between  the  soul  and  God, 
or  a  visible  body  with  invisible  privileges.  All  its 
subordinate  characteristics  flow  from  this  description. 
Does  it  impose  a  creed,  or  impose  rites  and  ceremo- 
nies, or  change  ordinances,  or  remit  and  retain  sins, 
or  rebuke  or  punish,  or  accept  offerings,  or  send  out 
ministers,  or  invest  its  ministers  with  authority,  or 
accept  of  reverence  or  devotion  in  their  persons — all 
this  is  because  it  is  Christ's  visible  presence.  It 
stands  for  Christ.  Can  it  convey  the  power  of  the 
Spirit  ?  does  grace  attend  its  acts  ?  can  it  touch,  or 
bathe,  or  seal,  or  lay  on  hands  ?  can  it  use  material 
things  for  spiritual  purposes  ?  are  its  temples  holy  ? 
all  this  comes  of  its  being,  so  far,  what  Christ  was 
on  earth.  Is  it  a  ruler,  prophet,  priest,  intercessor, 
teacher  ?  It  has  titles  such  as  these,  in  its  measure, 
as  being  the  representative  and  instrument  of  him 
that  is  unseen.  Does  it  claim  a  palace  and  a  throne, 
an  altar  and  a  doctor's  chair,  the  gold,  frankincense, 
and  myrrh,  of  the  rich  and  wise,  an  universal  empire 
and  a  never-ending  cession  ?  All  this  is  so,  because 
it  is  what  Christ  is.  All  the  offices,  names,  honours, 
powers,  which  it  claims,  depend  upon  the  simple 
question,  'Has  Christ,  or  has  he  not,  left  a  represen- 

»  Bishop  Doane,  of  New  Jersey. 


260  THE    IIIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

tative  behind  him?'  Now,  if  he  has,  all  is  easy  and 
intelligible:  this  is  wha.t  Churchmen  maintain;  they 
welcome  the  news;  and  they  recognize  in  the  Church's 
acts,  but  the  fulfilment  of  the  high  trust  committed 
to  her."i 

There  is  no  ambiguity  here.  ''  The  Church  is 
WHAT  Christ  is."  It  can  make  and  unmake  "rites," 
"ordinances,"  "creeds."  It  can  punish,  pardon,  im- 
part the  Holy  Spirit,  justify,  renew,  sanctify,  seal.  It 
is  a  Prophet,  Priest,  King.  In  a  word,  it  is  enthled 
as  Christ's  representative,  to  the  "  offices,  names, 
honours,  and  powers,"  which  belong  to  Christ  him- 
self. What  has  the  harlot  who  sits  upon  the  seven 
hills,  ever  claimed  for  herself  beyond  this  ? 

Let  us  hear  the  Tractators  on  the  same  subject. 
"  The  notion  of  the  Church  as  the  storehousie  and 
direct  channel  of  grace,  as  a  divine  ordinance  not 
merely  to  be  maintained  for  order's  sake,  or  because 
schism  is  a  sin,  but  to  be  approached  joyfully  and 
expectantly  as  a  definite  instrument,  or  rather  the 
appointed  means  of  spiritual  blessings — as  an  ordi- 
nance which  conveys  secret  strength  and  life  to  every 
one  who  shares  in  it,  unless  there  be  some  actual 
moral  impediment  in  his  own  mind — this  is  a  doctrine 
which  as  yet  is  but  faintly  understood  among  us.  .  .  . 
We  have  almost  ernbraced  the  doctrine,  that  God 
conveys  grace  only  through  the  instrumentality  of  the 
mental  energies,  that  is,  through  faith,  prayer,  active 
spiritual  contemplations,  or  {what  is  called)  commu- 
nion with  God,  in  contradiction  to  the  primitive  view 
according  to  which  the  Church  and  her  sacraments 
are  the  ordained  and  direct  visible  means  of  convey- 
ing to  the  soul  what  is  in  itself  supernatural  and  un- 

'  Brit,  Critic,  No.  66,  p.  451. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  261 

seen."i  "  Had  we  been  left  to  conjecture,  we  might 
have  supposed  that  in  the  more  perfect  or  spiritual 
system,  the  gifts  of  grace  would  rather  have  been 
attached  to  certain  high  moral  performances,  whereas 
they  are  deposited  in  mere  positive  ordinances,  as  if 
to  warn  us  against  dropping  the  ceremonial  of  Chris- 
tianity."2  "Almighty  God  has  said,  his  Son's  merits 
shall  Avash  away  all  sin,  and  that  they  shall  be  con- 
veyed to  believers  through  the  two  sacraments." ^ 
"  These  powers  of  the  Church,"  observes  Prof  Sew- 
ell,  a  writer  of  high  repute  with  this  school,  in  speak- 
ing of  the  Church  and  the  clergy,  "are  very  great; 
they  are  even  awful;  if  not  conferred  by  God,  they 
are  blasphemously  assumed  by  man.  The  power  of 
communicating  to  man  the  divine  nature  itself,  of 
bringing  down  the  deity  from  heaven,  of  infusing  the 
Spirit  into  the  souls  of  miserable  mortals — this,  which 
is  nothing  more  than  the  every-day  promise  of  the 
Church,  every  time  he  [the  priest]  stands  at  the  font, 
or  ministers  at  the  altar,  is  so  awful  and  so  tremen- 
dous, that  we  scarcely  dare  to  read  it,  except  in  fa- 
miliar words  which  scarcely  touch  the  ear."^ 

To  say,  after  citing  these  passages,  that  the  Pusey- 
ite  system  puts  the  Church  and  the  ministry  in  the 
place  of  Christ,  is  only  to  express  a  feeling  which 
must  force  itself  upon  every  mind  that  is  open  to  con- 
viction. 

This  feature  of  the  system  has  been  officially  and 
severely  censured  by  Dr.  Sumner,  the  able  and  excel- 
lent Bishop  of  Chester.  "  Practically,"  he  observes 
in  his  Charge  to  his  clergy  for  1841,  "  the  Saviour  is 
treated  with  dishonour,  when  the  Church  which  he 

1  Oxford  Tracts,  Vol.  II.  Pref.  3  Tract,  No.  41. 

2  Tract,  No.  32.  4  Christian  Morals,  p.  27. 


262  THE    IIIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

has  established  is  made  to  usurp  his  place,  to  perform 
his  acts,  to  receive  his  homage;  is  so  represented  as 
to  be  virtually  the  author  of  salvation,  instead  of  the 
channel  through  which  salvation  flows.  This  is,  in 
truth,  to  depose  him  from  his  throne,  and  to  invest 
his  subjects  with  the  authority  which  belongs  to  him- 
self alone."  "  To  set  up,  as  it  were,  Church-princi- 
ples in  opposition  to  the  principles  of  the  Gospel,  and 
place  them  in  invidious  contrast,  is  alike  unreasonable 
and  unscriptural.  It  is  to  confound  the  means  of 
grace  with  the  author  of  grace ;  to  worship  the  thing 
made  and  to  dishonour  the  maker.  It  is  to  array 
against  Christ  the  instrumentality  which  he  has 
established  against  Satan.''  "  Therefore  he  ordain- 
ed the  ministry  and  he  ordained  the  sacraments,  that 
there  might  be  a  Church — a  continual  '  congregation 
of  faithful  men.'  And  shall  this  Church  boast  itself 
against  its  Author,  and  claim  a  power  which  he  has 
never  given?  Shall  the  earthly  members  assume  the 
authority  of  their  heavenly  principal?  Such  seems 
to  be  the  case  when  they  confound  church-member- 
ship with  faith;  or  so  magnify  the  ministrations  be- 
longing to  their  office,  as  virtually  to  represent  that, 
except  through  their  instrumentality,  there  is  no  sal- 
vation." "  The  Church  has  been  made  first  an  ab- 
straction, then  a  person,  and  then  a  Saviour.  The 
Church  thus  invested  with  divinity,  has  the  minister 
as  her  visible  repVesentative,  and  he,  explaining  the 
prophetic  anticipation,  has  assumed  the  place  of 
God.'' 

The  justness  of  this  rebuke  will  be  still  more  appa- 
rent as  we  proceed,  for  I  shall  have  frequent  occasion 
to  advert  to  the  subject  before  I  conclude. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  263 


CHAPTER  IX. 


THE  SYSTEM  AT  VARIANCE  WITH  THE  GENERAL  TONE  OF 
THE  NEW  TESTAMENT. 

After  the  tolerably  complete  delineation  of  the  High- 
Church  system  given  in  the  last  chapter,  I  feel  war- 
ranted in  specifying"  as  another  of  its  leading  charac- 
teristics, ITS  CONTRARIETY  TO  THE  WHOLE  SCOPE  AND 
TENOR   OF  THE   NeW  TESTAMENT. 

I  speak  of  it  now  as  a  system,  without  reference  to 
the  arguments  that  may  be  urged  for  or  against  its 
several  parts.  No  man  who  is  not  already  a  High- 
Churchman,  can  lay  down  the  New  Testament  and 
take  up  the  Oxford  Tracts,  without  feeling  that  the 
works  are  devoted  to  the  exposition  of  two  different 
kinds  of  religion.  The  transition  is  like  that  a  trav- 
eller experiences  in  ascending  from  the  sunny  plains 
of  Italy  to  the  bleak  and  sterile  region  of  the  upper 
Alps.  He  may,  it  is  true,  find  here  and  there  in  some 
sheltered  spot  a  sweet  flower  or  two,  but  they  only 
serve  as  a  foil  to  the  surrounding  desolation.  So  there 
are  many  admirable  Scripture  truths  scattered  through 
the  Oxford  Tracts,  and  other  works  of  that  class,  but 
they  only  set  off  the  more  vividly  the  contrast  be- 
tween the  frigid,  ceremonial  system  upon  which 
they  are  engrafted,  and  the  glorious  Gospel  of  Christ. 
If  the  High-Church  scheme  be  true,  it  is  inexpli- 
cable why  the  New  Testament  should  have  been 
written  as  it  is.  That  scheme  makes  the  polity  of 
the  Church — its  external  form  and  organization — the 


264  THE    HIGII-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

primary  thing.  It  does,  it  is  true,  enforce  the  ne- 
cessity of  justification  and  spiritual  renewal:  but  it 
teaches  that  no  man  is  authorized  to  expect  these 
blessings  unless  he  places  himself  under  a  Prelatical 
ministry.  It  inculcates  faith  and  repentance,  and 
other  Christian  graces :  but  it  is  careful  to  say  that 
these  graces  are  only  to  be  cultivated  with  success  in 
a  communion  Prelatically  organized.  The  organiza- 
tion is  the  fundamental  thing.  It  is  so  in  the  theory, 
and  in  the  authorized  expositions  of  it.  The  first 
volume  of  the  Tracts  for  the  Times,  contains  no  less 
than  eight  distinct  papers  on  "  Apostolical  Succes- 
sion." And  the  same  precedence  is  given  to  matters 
of  order  in  the  writings  of  the  school  generally.  The 
word  "  Church"  will  be  found  in  their  books  ten  times 
where  Christ  is  named  once.  They  abound  with 
disquisitions  on  the  dignity,  Apostolic  lineage,  and 
powers  of  the  Bishops,  but  have  little  to  say  of  the 
moral  qualifications  essential  to  the  office.  Tliey  pre- 
sent us  with  elaborate  essays  on  crucifixes  and  sur- 
plices, painted  windows  and  wax  candles,  attitudes 
and  genuflexions,  and  such  like  "mint,  anise,  and 
cummin;"  while  the  weightier  matters  of  the  law  are 
too  often  enforced,  if  enforced  at  all,  on  principles 
which  savour  more  of  Popery  than  of  the  free  spirit 
of  Christianity. 

Now  the  most  superficial  reader  of  the  New  Tes- 
tament must  be  aware  that  its  whole  tone  is  alien 
from  a  system  like  this.  The  subject  of  Church  gov- 
ernment is  rarely  introduced,  and  then,  for  the  most 
part,  in  an  incidental  way.  A  few  general  principles 
are  clearly  laid  down;  but  no  one  model  is  so  prescrib- 
ed as  to  countenance  the  idea  that  its  adoption  is 
essential  to  the  being  of  a  Church.     This  is  not  to  say 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  265 

that  air  forms  of  Church  government  are  equally  good 
or  equally  allowable.  The  author  has  no  such  behef; 
nor  does  he  regard  questions  of  polity  and  order  as 
trivial  matters.  It  is  only  the  relative  position  they 
occupy  in  the  New  Testament  with  which  he  is  con- 
cerned in  this  connexion. — "  Bishops"  are  repeatedly 
mentioned,  but  it  is  for  the  most  part  to  specify  the 
spiritual  qualifications  they  ought  to  possess,  or  to 
admonish  them  of  their  duties  and  responsibilities. 
If  the  people  are  commanded  to  "  obey"  their  pastors, 
they  are  also  instructed  to  prove  those  who  come  to 
them  as  religious  teachers — to  prove  them,  not  as  a 
High-Churchman  would  direct,  by  ascertaining  their 
ecclesiastical  pedigree,  but  by  scrutinizing  their  doc- 
trine and  their  lives.  (See  Matt.  vii.  15 — 20.  1  John 
iv.  1 — 3.  2  John  v.  10.)  And  as  to  rites  and  cere- 
monies, they  are  seldom  adverted  to  except  for  the 
purpose  of  guarding  men  against  placing  an  undue 
reliance  upon  them. 

The  New  Testament,  then,  does  not  at  all  har- 
monize with  this  system.  It  would  require  to  be  re- 
cast before  the  two  could  be  brought  together.  To 
effect  this,  the  doctrines  of  the  atonement,  justification 
by  faith,  and  regeneration,  would  have  to  be  taken 
out  of  the  niches  in  which  they  have  been  placed,  and 
the  vacancies  supplied  by  dissertations  on  "Apos- 
tolical Succession."  The  marks  of  a  "true  Church," 
should  supersede  the  manifold  exhortations  to  holi- 
ness of  life — a  sprinkling  of  these  being  of  course 
retained  in  suitable  connexions.  The  sacraments 
should  be  largely  dwelt  upon  as  the  chief  sources  of 
grace ;  and  preaching  be  thrown  into  any  recess 
where  it  would  not  impair  the  general  symmetry  of 
the  plan.     At  least  one-half  the  book  should  be  ap- 

23 


266  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

propriated  to  rites  and  ceremonies.  In  this,  provision 
should  be  made  for  an  order  of  Christian  Levites 
whose  business  it  should  be  to  keep  genealogical 
tables  of  the  Bishops.  Minute  directions  should, 
be  given  as  to  sacerdotal  vestments,  the  forms  of 
Churches,  the  arrangement  of  the  chancel,  the  desk, 
the  "altar''  and  the  font.  No  room  should  be  left 
for  incertitude  as  to  whether  matins  and  vespers 
should  be  celebrated  daily  or  only  on  Saints'  days — 
whether  the  crucifix  should  be  worn  about  the  person 
and  put  on  the  tops  of  houses  and  churches — whether 
churches  should  be  constructed  with  or  without  pews 
— whether  flowers  should  be  worn  on  festival  days, 
and  if  so,  whQiher  green-house  flowers  or  flowers  of 
forced  growth,  would  in  any  case  answer — whether 
one  candle  or  two  should  be  put  upon  the  "altar," 
and  whether  they  should  be  lighted  or  not.^  These 
and  many  similar  points  which  have  occasioned  no 
small  debate  in  our  day,  would  all  require  to  be  au- 
thoritatively settled  in  the  New  Testament  in  order  to 
adjust  it  to  the  system  we  are  examining.  Further- 
more, the  "  Apostolical  Succession,"  as  lying  at  the 
foundation  of  the  system,  should  be  presented  in  the 
most  lucid  and  imposing  manner.  Not  only  should 
the  Apostle's  fling  at  those  who  busy  themselves 
about  "  endless  genealogies"  be  struck  out,  but  also 
the  account  of  Simon  Magus,  whose  baptism,  though 
administered   by   Peter    himself,  was    so    far   from 

1  Even  the  Bishop  of  London  in  a  late  charge,  while  he  reprobates 
some  of  the  Oxford  superstitions,  sees  "  no  harm"  in  two  wax  can- 
dles, provided  they  are  not  lighted^  and  approves  of  the  arrangement 
"lately  adopted  in  several  churches,  by  which  the  clergyman  looks  to 
the  south  while  reading  prayers,  and  to  the  west  while  reading  les- 
sons I"     Tendimus  in  Latium. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  267 

regenerating  him,  that  he  was  immediately  afterward 
pronounced  to  be  "  in  the  gall  of  bitterness  and  in  the 
bond  of  iniquity."  Again,  the  requisite  information 
should  be  supplied  for  solving  a  great  many  import- 
ant practical  questions  which  now  divide  those  who 
agree  on  most  other  points.  Of  this  kind  are  the  fol- 
lowing, to-wit : — What  is  essential  to  the  validity  of 
orders  ?  If  a  Bishop  becomes  an  avowed  Arian  or 
Infidel,  are  his  ordinations  valid  ?  If  a  Bishop  ob- 
tains his  office  by  fraud  and  Simony,  can  he  per- 
petuate the  true  succession?  Should  the  leading 
Bishops  for  several  centuries  be,  on  the  showing  of 
their  own  historians,  a  race  oi profligates,  simoniacs, 
usurjjers,  murderers,  and  the  like,  can  they  keep  up 
the  succession  and  transmit  the  Holy  Ghost?  And 
are  these  Bishops  to  be  recognized  as  being  in  the 
Church,  while  ministers  of  the  gospel  who  appear  to 
be  eminently  wise,  holy,  and  useful  men,  but  who 
have  not  been  prelatically  ordained,  are  to  be  denoun- 
ced as  schismatics  and  consigned  to  "uncovenanted 
mercy  ?'^ — Facts  show  that  there  is  some  room  for  a 
difference  of  opinion  on  questions  of  this  sort,  even 
among  High-Churchmen,  and  this  might  be  effectually 
precluded,  if  the  New  Testament  were  adjusted  to  the 
system,  and  made  as  explicit  as  it  is  now  "reserved" 
on  all  matters  of  form  and  external  order. 

That  the  Bible  in  its  present  form,  does  not  meet 
the  wants  of  this  school,  is  not  merely  admitted  but 
insisted  upon  by  themselves.  The  Romanists  are 
not  more  hearty  than  they  are,  in  repudiating  the 
great  Protestant  principle,  that  the  Bible  is  the  all- 
sufficient  and  only  rule  of  faith  and  practice.  ^  The 
system,  on  the  confession  of  its  ablest  advocates,  can- 

iSee  Chapter  VII. 


268  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

not  be  bolstered  up  without  the  aid  of  the  Fathers ; 
and  the  Bible  will  only  speak  its  language  when 
stretched  upon  the  Procrustean  bed  of  "  Catholic  tra- 
dition." It  ought  not  to  surprise  us,  then,  to  find,  on 
instituting  the  comparison,  that  this  system  is  at  va- 
riance with  the  whole  scope  and  tenor  of  the  New 
■Testament :  for  this  is  just  what  the  teachings  of  its 
expounders  would  naturally  lead  us  to  expect. 

The  same  discrepancy  will  appear,  if,  instead  of 
comparing  the  system  as  a  whole  with  the  general 
tone  of  the  New  Testament,  we  bring  its  several 
parts  to  the  test  of  Scripture.  To  select  a  single  fea- 
ture,— one  would  think  from  the  writings  of  this 
school,  that  the  New  Testament  must  be  a  treatise 
on  baptism;  that  baptism  was  the  main  topic  of  our 
Saviour's  discourses  and  the  pervading  theme  of  the 
Apostles'  preaching;  and  that  the  great  business  of 
the  Christian  ministry  was,  not  to  preach  the  Gospel, 
but  to  administer  the  sacraments.  Baptism  is,  in 
their  scheme,  the  grand  instrument  by  which  men 
who  are  "dead  in  trespasses  and  sins,"  are  to  be 
made  alive,  rebels  restored  to  the  favour  of  God,  and 
this  apostate  world  reclaimed  from  the  countless  evils 
of  the  fall. — "It  is  notoriously  the  doctrine  of  the 
Trent  Decrees,"  observes  Bishop  Mcllvaine  in  his 
elaborate  work  on  "  Oxford  Theology, "  "  that  bap- 
tism is  <the  only  instrumental  cause'  of  justification; 
so  absolutely  necessary  thereto  that  without  it  jus- 
tification is  obtained  by  none.  This  is  precisely 
the  doctrine  of  the  Oxford  School.  .  .  Justification  in 
baptism,  and  only  there,  is  the  sole  subject  of  a 
whole  volume  of  Oxford  Tracts,  called  '  Scriptural 
Vieios  of  Holy  Baptism.'  "  (p.  213.)  Again,  he  says, 
"  "Without  a  doubt  baptism  is  considered  in  Oxford 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  269 

divinity,  as  efficacious  to  justification  in  the  adult 
recipient,  without  any  faith  except  such  as  devils 
may  have,  as  well  as  we.  He  is  made  righteous  by 
baptism,  from  being,  up  to  the  time  of  baptism,  uqi- 
righteous.^^  (p.-217.)  In  proof  of  the  accuracy  of  this 
representation,  it  might  be  sufficient  to  refer  to  the 
passages  already  given  from  Puseyite  writers.  The 
importance  of  the  subject  will,  however,  justify  a  few 
additional  quotations. 

Dr.  Pusey  earnestly  maintains  that  by  baptism  an 
individual  receives  "  the  forgiveness  of  sin  and  a  new 
nature,"  and  "  is  made  a  real  child  of  God  and  a 
real  member  of  Christ,  not  an  outward  member  of 
an  outward  body  of  people  called  Christians."  Again, 
he  says,  "  Indeed  this  may  be  set  down  as  the  es- 
sence of  sectarian  doctrine,  to  consider  faith,  and  not 
the  sacraments,  as  the  proper  instrument  of  justifica- 
tion and  other  gospel  gifts ;  instead  of  holding  that 
the  grace  of  Christ  comes  to  us  altogether  from  with- 
out (as  from  Him,  so  through  the  externals  of  his 
ordaining.")  The  tract  writers  have  a  great  deal  to 
say  about  "justification  by  faith:"  but  when  their 
views  come  to  be  examined,  it  turns  out  that  faith 
itself  derives  all  its  efficacy  from  baptism.  Thus 
they  say,  "Faith,  as  gaining  its  virtue  from,  baptism, 
is  one  thing  before  that  sacred  ordinance ;  another 
after."  "  Justifying  faith  before  baptism,  is  not  ne- 
cessarily even  a  m,oral  virtue,  but  when  illuminated 
by  love  and  ennobled  by  the  Spirit,"  (in  baptism)  "it 
is  a  name  for  all  graces  together."  Before  baptism, 
"  it  is  without  availing  power,  without  life  in  the 
sight  of  God,  as  regards  our  justification" — that  is, 
"  as  regards  the  indwelling  of  the  Spirit,"  which  is 
the  ground  of  justification  according  to  this  system. 

23* 


270  THE    IIIGH-CIIURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

Until  it  is  baptized,  "  it  [faith]  is  full  of  terror  and 
disquiet,  vague,  and  dull-minded,  feeble,  sickly,  way- 
ward, fitful,  inoperative,"  "  nothing  till  Christ  regene- 
rate it"  in  baptism.  "  When  it  comes  for  baptism. . . 
it  comes* to  the  fount  of  life  to  be  made  alive,  as  the 
dry  bones,  in  the  prophet's  vision,  were  brought  to- 
gether in  preparation  for  the  breath  of  God  to  quicken 
them."  "We  are  saved,"  says  Dr.  Pusey,  "by  faith 
bringing  us  to  baptism,  and  by  baptism  God  saves 
us" — "faith  being  but  tJie  sine  qua  non,  the  neces- 
sary condition  on  our  parts  for  duly  receiving  the 
grace  of  Christ" — and  "  the  sacraments,  not  faith, 
being  the  proper  instrument  of  our  justification." 
Again;  "Faith,"  says  Mr.  Newman,  "does  not  pre- 
cede justification  ;  but  justification  precedes  it  and 
makes  it  justifying.  Baptism  is  the  primary  instru- 
ment and  creates  faith  to  be  vjhat  it  is,  and  other- 
wise, is  not,  giving  it  power  and  rank,  and. constitu- 
ting it  as  its  own  successor.  Each  has  its  own  office; 
baptism  at  the  time,  faith  ever  after, — the  sacraments 
the  instrumental,  faith  the  sustaining,  cause."  The 
same  view  precisely  is  given  by  Bishop  Doane,  in  his 
funeral  sermon  at  Troy :  "  His  first  care  [he  is  speak- 
ing of  the  deceased  Rector,]  was  to  graft  them  in,  by 
holy  baptism,  into  the  living  vine ;  and  then  to  keep 
them  there  by  grace  through  faith,  unto  salvation."^ 
In  other  words,  men  are  first  united  tcf  Christ  by 
baptism,  and  then  the  union  is  sustained  by  faith. 
Or,  as  Bishop  Mcllvaine  has  more  comprehensively 
summed  up  this  part  of  the  system ;  "  Faith  before 
baptism,  is,  in  this  divinity,  no  instrument  at  all, 
because  dead.  In  baptism,  it  is  no  instrument  at  all, 
because  not   made  alive  till   baptism  is  completed. 

»  Page  25. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  271 

Sfter  baptism,  it  is  an  instrument  of  justification, 
only  as  it  sustains  what  baptism  has  already  effected, 
and  which,  when  lost,  it  cannot  renew. '^  (p.  209.) 

Now  every  reader  of  the  Bible  who  is  not  already 
entangled  in  the  web  of  a  mere  sacramental  religion, 
must  know  that  the  sacred  writers  assign  no  such 
place  as  this  to  baptism  in  their  scheme  of  Christi- 
anity. That  regeneration  may  accompany  baptism, 
no  one  denies.  But  so  far  were  the  Apostles  and 
their  associates  from  regarding  this  ordinance  as  the 
specific  means  of  regeneration  and  of '' creating^ ^  true 
faith,  that  they  baptized  no  one  until  he  professed 
repentance  and  faith  in  the  Redeemer.  We  never 
find  them  sending  an  anxious  sinner  to  the  "Church" 
and  the  baptismal  font  for  relief.  They  knew  where 
the  "storehouse  of  grace"  was,  and  it  was  their 
delight  to  show  trembUng,  heavy-laden  souls  the 
way  to  it.  The  presumptuous  thought  had  not 
occurred  to  them,  which  is  so  captivating  to  many 
of  their  "successors,"  that  God  could  not  accept  a 
sinner,  until  they  had  received  him  into  the  Church — 
that  the  Spirit  could  not  apply  the  "  blood  of  sprink- 
ling" to  his  conscience,  until  they  had  washed  him 
with  Avater — that  Christ,  could  not  say  to  him,  "  Thy 
sins  are  forgiven  thee:  go  in  peace  !"  until  they  had 
pronounced  over  him  the  words  of  absolution — that 
no  divine  influences  could  reach  his  agitated  breast, 
until  they  had  put  him  "in  communication"  with  his 
Maker,  by  establishing  a  sacramental  connexion  be- 
tween him  and  themselves.  If  they  baptize  three 
thousand  on  the  day  of  Pentecost,  they  are  those  who 
have  "gladly  received  the  word:"i  if  an  Ethiopian 
Eunuch  expresses  an  earnest  desire  for  baptism,  he  is 

•  Acts  ii.  41. 


272  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

told  on  what  condition  his  request  will  be  granted, 
— "  If  thou  believest  [not  with  a  '  vague,'  *  sickly,' 
'  inoperative'  faith,  but]  with  all  thy  heart,  thou  may- 
est  :"i  if  Saul  of  Tarsus  is  baptized,  it  is  not  until  he 
has  spent  three  days  in  prayer  and  humiliation  i^  if 
Cornelius  and  his  "kinsmen  and  friends"  are  baptized, 
it  is  after  they  have  "received  the  Holy  Ghost--" ^  if 
Lydia  and  the  jailer  are  baptized,  it  is  because  "  the 
heart"  of  one  has  been  "  opened"  by  the  Lord  to 
attend  to  the  things  spoken  by  Paul,  and  the  other 
avows  himself  a  believer  in  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ.^ 
This  was  the  uniform  practice  of  the  Apostles.  Not 
an  instance  can  be  pointed  out  of  their  baptizing  an 
adult  otherwise  than  on  a  profession  of  his  faith.  The 
case  of  Simon  Magus  is  no  exception,  for  he  professed 
to  believe :  although  his  case  does  (as  before  intima- 
ted) confute  the  dogma  of  "  baptismal  regeneration." 
So  far,  indeed,  were  they  from  restricting  salvation  to 
those  already  in  communion  with  themselves,  and 
binding  the  Most  High  to  bestow  his  grace  only 
through  their  ministrations,  that  Peter,  enslaved  as  he 
had  been  to  Jewish  prejudices,  dared  not  withhold 
baptism  from  Cornelius  and  his  friends,  after  "'  the 
Holy  Ghost  had  fallen  upon  them  :"  and  in  defending 
himself  for  this  act  before  his  brethren,  he  says  with 
unanswerable  force  of  reasoning,  "  Forasmuch,  then, 
as  God  gave  them  the  like  gift  as  he  did  unto  us  who 
believed  on  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ,  what  was  I  that  I 
could  withstand  God  ?"  It  was  reserved  for  the 
"Apostles"  of  a  later  age,  to  seize  upon  the  Church  as 
their  Church,  and  challenge  a  monopoly  of  the  gifts 
and  graces  of  the  Spirit,  and  put  themselves  and  the 

1  Acts  viii.  37.  3  ibid.  x.  47. 

2  Ibid.  ix.  9.18.  4ibid.  xvi.  14,  31. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  273 

sacraments  in  the  place  of  the  Saviour,  and  '^  with- 
stand God"  by  consigning  to  "uncovenanted  mercy" 
those  whom  He  has  beautified  with  hoUness  and 
adorned  with  the  gems  of  salvation.  The  elements  of 
this  scheme,  however,  were,  it  is  evident  from  their 
epistles,  at  work  even  in  the  days  of  Paul  and  his 
fellow-labourers  ;  and  after  a  few  centuries  the  system 
was  evolved  in  all  its  colossal  proportions — a  bap- 
tized paganism — a  pompous,  oppressive,  bloody  hier- 
archy. 

It  is  substantially  the  same  system  which  has  now 
sprung  forth  from  the  bosom  of  a  Reformed  Church, 
(too  scantily  reformed,  indeed,  as  the  best  and  wisest 
of  the  men  engaged  in  its  Reformation,  declared  with 
sorrow  at  the  time)  and  which  is  arming  the  Protes- 
tants of  every  land  against  its  lordly  aggressions. 


CHAPTER  X. 


TENDENCY  OF  THE  SYSTEM  TO  AGGRANDIZE  THE  PRELATICAL 

CLERGY  ; AND    TO    SUBSTITUTE  A  RITUAL   RELIGION  FOR 

TRUE  CHRISTIANITY. 

All  false  religions  minister  to  the  pride  and  ambition 
of  their  priesthood.  The  same  characteristic  marks 
the  various  corrupt  forms  of  Christianity;  and  the 
degree  in  which  it  attaches  to  them,  will  usually 
denote  the  measure  of  their  corruption.  Tried  by  this 
rule,  the  High-Church  system  will  be  found  seriously 
defective.  I  shall  exhibit,  in  this  chapter,  its  tendency 

to  AGGRANDIZE  THE  PRELATICAL  CLERGY.    TllC  rCadcr 


274  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

will  understand  me  as  speaking  not  of  their  design,  {ox 
with  this  I  have  nothing  to  do ;  but  simply  of  the  ten- 
dency of  the  system.  What  this  tendency  is,  may  be 
learned  from  a  single  fact,  viz.  that  some  of  the  High- 
Church  party  have  gone  to  the  length  of  affirming  that 
Christ  has  actually  transferred  his  Headship  over 
THE  Church,  in  so  far,  that  is,  as  the  government  of 
the  Church-militant  is  concerned,  to  the  Bishops. 
This  doctrine  is  distinctly  laid  down  by  Bishop 
McCoskry  of  Michigan,  in  his  sermon  entitled,  "Epis- 
copal Bishops,  the  Successors  of  the  Apostles."  From 
this  sermon  I  quote  a  few  passages.  "  He  [Christ]  is 
the  Head  and  permanent  Ruler  thereof,  and  although 
now  removed  from  sight  and  seated  on  his  mediato- 
rial throne,  yet  he  governs  and  regulates  this  Church, 
or  Kingdom,  (as  it  is  frequently  called,)  by  his  consti- 
tuted agents,  to  whom  he  has  com.mitted  the  very 
same  authority  which  he  received  from,  the  Fa- 
therP  "  Every  thing  that  could  be  possessed  by  a 
mere  human  being,  was  given  by  the  Saviour.  He 
was,  as  the  Apostle  declares,  "the  Head  of  the  body'' 
— consequently  this  Headship  was  transferred,  and 
all  the  power  necessary  to  preserve  and  regulate  the 
body.  For  if  the  power  to  preserve  and  regulate  the 
body  be  not  transferred  with  the  Headship  of  the 
body,  the  body  itself  must  cease  to  exist ;  and  of 
course  the  Church  of  Christ  comes  to  an  end.  This 
cannot  be.  It  must  follow,  them,  that  as  Christ  is  the 
permanent  Ruler  and  Head  of  this  body  now  in  hea- 
ven, so  are  those  to  whom  He  transferred  this  power, 
permanent  rulers  and  heads  on  earth,  for  He  trans- 
ferred the  earthly  power  over  his  Church.''  "  In  this 
transaction  [referring  to  John  xx.  21 — 23,]  they  [the 
Apostles]  ivere  raised  nji  to  the  very  sarne  office  which 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  275 

Christ  himself  held, — I  mean  that  which  belongs  to 
Him  m  his  human  nature  as  head  and  governor  of 
the  Church.  They  were  to  supply  his  place  in  this 
respect  ....  and,  in  short,  to  do  every  thing  ivhich 
Christ  ivould  have  done,  had  he  continued  on  the 
earth."  "They  received  the  full  poioer  which  Christ 
possessed.'^  "  So  long  as  the  Saviour  exercised  the 
office  of  High  Priest,  and  before  he  transferred  it 
to  the  apostles,  immediately  preceding  his  ascension, 
there  were  three  grades  in  the  ministry."  "It  cannot 
be  supposed  for  one  moment,  that  the  Saviour  would 
transfer  so  great  an  office  as  he  himself  had  received 
from  his  Father,  to  feeble  and  short-sighted  men, 
without  giving  them  instructions  as  to  the  manner  in 
which  its  duties  were  to  be  performed,  and  more 
especially,  whether  it  could  be  transferred  to  others." 
The  writer  goes  on  to  argue,  that  this  Headship  and 
power-  over  the  Church  which  were  transferred  from 
Christ  to  his  Apostles,  were  by  them  transferred  to 
others,  and  by  their  successors  to  others,  and  so  on 
down  to  the  Bishops  of  our  day.  And  if  this  has  not 
been  done,  "all,"  he  declares,  "who  profess  to  be 
commissioned  as  ambassadors  of  Christ,  are  gross 
imjiostors.'^^^ 

I  have  multiplied  these  quotations  in  order  that  it 
may  be  seen  that  the  doctrine  ascribed  to  the  author, 
is  not  thrown  out  by  mere  implication,  but  explicitly 
laid  down  and  earnestly  defended.  According  to 
the  views  here  presented,  Christ  has  transferred  his 
High-Priesthood,  the  earthly  Headship  of  his  Church, 
and  the  power  to  govern  it,  to  the  Bishops.  They 
hold  "the  very  same  office   which  beheld," — they 

'  See  the  Sermon,  pp.  6,  7,  10,  11,  12,  17.  See  also  an  able  re- 
view  of  it  in  "  Duffield  on  Episcopacy." 


276  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

''  have  received  the  full  power  which  He  possessed," 
— they  are  "to  do  every  tiling  which  He  would  have 
done,  had  he  continued  on  the  earth."  If  this  is  not 
putting  the  Bishops  in  the  place  of  Christ,  it  is  difficult 
to  say  what  ivould  be.  Rome  herself  has  scarcely 
gone  further  in  usurping  His  royal  prerogatives  and 
priestly  functions.  The  Scriptures  teach  with  a  ful- 
ness of  statement  and  illustration  which  would  render 
specific  references  superfluous,  that  Christ  has  never 
parted  with  his  regal  or  priestly  office — that  he  is  the 
only  Priest  of  the  new  dispensation,  and  is  now  exer- 
cising his  sacerdotal  function  of  intercession ;  and  that 
as  King,  he  reigns  on  earth  over  the  Church,  as  well 
as  in  heaven.  The  author  of  the  Sermon,  on  the  other 
hand,  assumes  that  Christ  has  "transferred"  these 
offices  and  powers  to  the  Bishops.  To  "transfer"  is 
to  "convey,  or  make  over  from  one  to  another."  Of 
course,  if  He  has  made  this  "  transfer,"  he  is  no  longer 
the  High  Priest,  or  the  Head  of  the  Church  militant. 
Whatever  prerogatives  or  functions,  pertain  to  these 
offices,  now  vest  in  the  Bishops.  He  has  delegated 
his  sovereignty  to  them ;  and  deals  with  men  in  spiri- 
tual affairs,  only  through  them  as  his  "  Vicegerents." 
I  am  not  disposed  to  characterize  this  doctrine  as  it 
deserves.  It  is  a  striking  proof  of  the  pernicious  and 
blinding  influence  of  the  High-Church  system,  that  a 
passage  so  opposed  to  the  whole  tenor  of  the  New 
Testament,  and  so  deeply  injurious  to  the  Saviour's 
honour,  could  have  been  penned  hy  the  author  of 
that  Sermon.  I  adduce  it  now,  however,  only  to 
show  that  the  system  tends  legitimately /o  aggran- 
dize the  Prelatical  clergy.  If  this  is  not  evident 
from  the  doctrine  presented  in  the  foregoing  extracts, 
no  comments  of  mine  could  make  it  so. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  277 

There  is  another  aspect  of  the  system,  frequently- 
hinted  at  in  the  progress  of  this  discussion,  which  ex- 
hibits this  tendency  with  no  less  clearness. — The 
whole  High-Church  theory  of  the  Christian  ministry, 
differs  materially  from  the  common  Protestant  views 
on  the  subject.  That  the  ministry  is  a  divine  and 
permanent  institution — that  it  is  essentially  connected 
with  the  best  interests  of  mankind  for  time  and  eter- 
nity— that  great  care  should  be  taken  to  prevent  un- 
worthy persons  from  assuming  its  functions — that 
faithful  ministers  are  entitled  to  the  respect  and  affec- 
tion of  their  people,  and  are,  within  the  sphere  of  their 
legitimate  authority  as  rulers  in  the  house  of  God,  to 
be  obeyed, — these  are  points  on  which  the  Protestant 
world  is,  with  few  exceptions,  united.  Christianity 
differs,  however,  from  Judaism  and  the  various  false 
religions,  in  not  being  a  sacerdotal  system.  It 
knows  no  Priest  except  the  great  High-Priest  of  our 
profession.  It  has  no  sacrifice  except  that  which  He 
offered  on  Calvary.  It  acknowledges  no  Mediator 
besides  Him  who  "  ever  liveth  to  make  intercession" 
for  his  people.  Christians  are  styled  a  ''  holy  priest- 
hood" and  are  said  to  offer  up  "spiritual  sacrifices." 
But  the  terms  "priest"  and  "sacrifice,"  are  not  once 
applied  in  the  New  Testament  to  Christian  ministers 
as  such  and  their  official  functions.  The  entire  vo- 
cabulary of  terms  proper  to  a  sacerdotal  religion,  is 
left  behind  by  the  sacred  writers  in  passing  from  the 
Old  Testament  to  the  New.  Popery,  with  its  usual 
disregard  for  the  authority  of  the  Bible,  has  com- 
pounded Judaism,  Paganism,  and  Christianity  to- 
gether, and  presents  the  anomaly  of  a  sacerdotal 
Christianity.  Its  ministers  are  priests  j  the  mass  is 
an  actual  sacrifice  of  Christ;   and   the   rights  and 

24 


278  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OE 

usages  of  the  Church  are  all  modeled  upon  this  basis. 
Puseyism  has  betrayed  its  affinity  for  this  scheme  in 
ways  not  to  be  mistaken.  It  distinctly  teaches  that 
a  change  is  effected  in  the  eucharistic  elements  by  the 
consecration,  and  that  a  sacrifice  of  some  sort  is  offer- 
ed in  that  ordinance.  What  this  change  is,  the  Ox- 
ford doctors  teach  with  so  much  "reserve"  that  it  is 
difficult  to  ascertain  their  precise  views.  But  it  is 
certain  that  few  problems  have  puzzled  them  more 
than  that  of  finding  a  via  media  between  the  Protes- 
tant view  of  the  ordinance,  and  transubstantiation. 
The  ministry,  also,  in  their  scheme  is  a  Priesthood. 
They  are  not  prepared  as  yet  to  adopt  the  entire 
Romish  doctrine  on  this  point;  still  less  do  they  in- 
cline to  the  Protestant  doctrine.  They  talk  familiar- 
ly of  "  the  Priesthood  in  the  Church."  And  when 
they  apply  this  designation  to  the  ministry,  they 
Tnean  it.  Ordination  is,  according  to  the  New  Testa- 
ment, a  very  simple  though  solemn  rite.  It  is  the 
setting  apart  of  a  person  to  a  particular  office  in  the 
Church,  to  which  he  has  been  duly  appointed ;  and  is 
to  be  performed,  with  prayer  and  the  laying  on  of 
hands,  by  persons  already  holding  the  same  or  a 
higher  office.  The  Church  of  Rome,  corrupting 
every  thing  in  Christianity  that  she  touched,  has 
transmuted  this  ceremony  into  something  very  mys- 
terious and  inscrutable.  She  teaches  that  a  certain 
"  indelible  character"  is  imparted  or  imprinted  in  or- 
dination. What  this  "character"  is  and  where  it  is 
lodged — whether  in  the  essence  of  the  soul,  the  will, 
the  understanding,  the  hand,  the  tongue — are  ques- 
tions that  have  been  fiercely  debated  among  the  Pa- 
pal theologians.  The  Oxford  School  have  borrowed 
the  notion,  as  they  have  too  many  other  articles,  from 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  279 

the  same  source.  They  speak  of  ordmation  as  con- 
veying some  mysterious  "  gift'^  to  the  recipient. 
This  gift  they  do  not  hesitate  to  affirm  is  the  Holy 
Ghost,  which,  they  allege,  is  actually  imparted  by 
the  Bishop  when  he  says  to  the  candidate,  "Receive 
the  Holy  Ghost.' ^  It  is  an  essential  part  of  the  dog- 
ma of  the  "Apostolical  Succession,"  as  the  passages 
cited  in  former  parts  of  this  volume  show,  that  this 
gift  has  been  transmitted  from  Christ  himself  to  the 
Prelates  of  our  day.  It  is  the  possession  of  this  rare 
endowment  which  qualifies  them  to  be  dispensers  of 
the  grace  stored  up  in  the  Church.  It  is  this  which 
gives  such  wonder-working  efficacy  to  the  ordinances 
they  administer,  and  imparts  to  them  the  capacity  of 
propagating  spiritual  and  saving  influences  to  the 
souls  of  those  who  receive  the  sacraments  at  their 
hands. 

Now — to  pause  here  for  a  moment — where  is  the 
evidence  that  any  such  gift  as  this  is  imparted  in  ordi- 
nation? An  endowment  so  rare,  so  miraculous  in 
its  effects,  must  needs  carry  with  it  convincing  proof 
of  its  own  existence  ?  Physical  strength,  symmetry, 
beauty,  intellectual  acumen,  learning,  benevolence, 
meekness,  fortitude — these,  and  all  other  personal 
attributes  of  whatever  kind,  attest  their  reality  by 
evidences  cognizable  to  our  faculties.  But  here  is  an 
attribute  which,  estimated  by  the  functions  ascribed 
to  it,  far  surpasses  in  value  and  efficacy  any  other 
conferred  on  man.  Where  is  the  evidence  of  it? 
What  proof  have  we  that  the  Bishop,  who  is  said  to 
confer  it  in  ordination,  has  it  to  bestow  ?  What  proof 
has  the  supposed  recipient  that  he  receives  it  ?  What 
proof  does  he  give  others  that  he  has  acquired  it? 
The  New  Testament  speaks  of  two  Avays  in  which 


2S0  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

the  Holy  Spirit  is  given  to  men,  viz.  1st,  in  his  mira- 
culous, and  secondly,  in  his  gracious  endowments. 
In  each  of  these,  the  gift  always  manifests  itself.     In 
the  former  case,  the  recipient  displays  superhuman 
powers  or  works  miracles;  in  the  latter,  there  is  a 
decisive,  though  not  in  all  cases  uniform,  change  in  his 
moral  character.     In  which  of  these  ways  are  we  to 
understand  the  Spirit  is  given  in  ordination?     If  the 
reply  is,  in  his  gracious  or  sanctifying  influences,  this 
is  confuted  by  the  fact  that  multitudes  of  men  have 
been  ordained,  who  remained  the  same  profligate, 
simoniacal,  sensual  wretches   after  ordination,  that 
they  were  before.     If  the  other  alternative  be  taken, 
then  we  further  demand  the  proof  that  these  miracu- 
lous gifts  have  been  imparted.     Can  the  individuals 
who  are  affirmed  to  have  received  them,  speak  with 
tongues,  or  prophesy,  or  heal  the  sick,  or  give  sight  to 
the  bhnd?      This  is  not  pretended.      But,  forsooth, 
"  they  are  now  invested  with  a  capacity  of  conveying 
regenerating  grace  to  sinners,  through  the  ordinance 
of  baptism,"  and  "  they  can  ^  make  the  body  and 
blood'  of  the  Redeemer  out  of  the  bread  and  wine  of 
the  Eucharist."     Well,  if  they  can,  the  question  has 
an  answer,  and  the  requisition  for  proof  is  met.     But 
how  do  we  know  that  they  can?     Why,  "because 
(so  the  argument  runs)  it  is  the  prerogative  of  all 
priests  who  have  been  Prelatically  ordained,  to  con- 
vey regenerating  grace  to  men  in  baptism,  and  to 
convert  the  elements  in  the  Lord's  Supper  into  the 
body  and  blood  of  Christ.     Biit  these  persons  have 
been  thus  ordained.     Therefore,  the  prerogatives  in 
question  belong  to  them."     The  only  fallacy  in  this 
reasoning  is,  that  it  takes  for  granted  the  thing  to  be 
proved.     The  major  proposition  assumes  that  Prelati- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  281 

cal  ordination  confers  the  power  to  effect  these  sacra- 
mental miracles,  which  is  the  whole  thing  in  dispute. 
Will  the  High-Church  theorist,  then,  abandoning  this 
ground,  appeal  to  facts  in  evidence  that  this  power 
is  communicated  in  ordination?  But  how  will  this 
avail  him?  Can  any  human  being  detect  the  least 
difference  in  the  eucharistic  emblems  before  and  after 
consecration?  Tried  by  every  test  to  which  it  is  pos- 
sible to  subject  them,  are  they  not  the  identical  bread 
and  wine  now  that  they  were  before  ?  And  as  to 
baptism,  are  adults  (to  say  nothing  of  children)  con- 
scious of  any  radical  transformation  of  character 
while  submitting  to  this  ordinance — of  such  a  change 
as  must  mark  a  transition  from  the  bondage  of  sin  to 
their  renewal  in  the  image  of  God,  from,  the  kingdom 
of  Satan  into  the  kingdom  of  Christ?  And  are  not 
thousands  baptized  every  year,  whose  lives  afford,  no 
satisfactory  evidence  whatever  that  this  mighty  reno- 
vation has  passed  upon  them?  We  repeat  the  de- 
mand, then :  Where  is  the  evidence  that  the  "  gift  of 
the  Holy  Ghost"  is  conferred  in  Prelatical  ordination? 
This,  demand  will  probably  be  met,  as  similar  requi- 
sitions are  apt  to  be,  by  a  repetition  of  the  favourite 
maxim  of  the  Oxford  gentlemen,  that  "  it  is  better  to 
believe  than  to  reason"  on  such  subjects, — and  so  all 
those  must  think,  who  are  willing  to  suspend  their 
salvation  upon  this  pretended  transmission  of  the 
Holy  Ghost  along  an  unbroken  line  of  Prelates. 

There  is  another  aspect  of  this  matter  which  de- 
serves to  be  adverted  to.  The  "gift  of  the  Holy 
Ghost,"  we  are  told,  has  been  transmitted  from  Christ 
through  the  supposed  Prelatical  line,  to  the  Bishops 
of  the  present  day.  Many  of  the  Prelates  in  this  hue 
have  been,  not  simply  men  destitute  of  religion,  but  as 
24* 


282  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

has  been  clearly  shown,  and  as  the  Roman  historians 
declare,  drunkards,  voluptuaries,  simoniacs,  usurpers, 
and,  in  fine,  monsters  in  wickedness.  The  doctrine 
under  consideration  requires  us  to  believe  that  every 
one  of  these  monsters,  who  was  ordained  with  the 
requisite  forms,  received  "  the  gift  of  the  Holy  Ghost" 
— that  this  gift  remained  in  them  through  all  the 
scenes  of  infamy  in  which  they  were  afterwards  con- 
cerned and  while  perpetrating  numerous  crimes,  any 
one  of  which  would,  in  a  land  of  law  and  Christian 
morals,  have  consigned  them  to  the  penitentiary  or 
the  gallows — and  that  these  mitred  villains,  reeking 
with  pollution,  actually  imparted  this  gift,  the  gift  of 
the  "  HOLY  GHOST,"  to  cvcry  individual  upon  whose 
head  they  laid  their  hands  in  ordination  !  Can  this 
horrible  dogma  be  believed?  Can  intelligent  and 
candid  Episcopalians  give  their  assent  to  a  doctrine 
so  insulting  to  that  pure  and  blessed  Spirit  who  is 
the  author  of  all  gracious  affections  and  desires,  and 
upon  whom  we  are  absolutely  dependent  for  spiritual 
illumination,  strength,  consolation,  and  final  triumph 
over  death  and  hell  ?  Yet  this  doctrine  is  inseparable 
from  the  High-Church  theory  of  the  Apostolical  Suc- 
cession. 

To  return  now  from  this  digression,  if,  indeed,  it 
be  a  digression, — nothing  can  be  plainer  than  that 
such  views  of  the  Christian  ministry  and  of  ordina- 
tion, as  we  have  been  considering,  must,  wherever 
they  are  allowed  to  be  carried  out,  tend  to  aggran- 
dize the  Prelatical  clergy.  It  is  hot  asserted  that 
the  scheme  is  advocated  with  this  design,  but  that 
this  is  its  legitimate  tendency.  The  ministry  occupy 
substantially  the  same  relative  position,  according  to 
this  system,  as  the  Jewish  or  Pagan  "priesthood." 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  2S3 

The  sanctuary  is  a  "  temple,"  with  its  «  altar,'^  and 
"sacrifices,"  and  "incense;"  and  they  are  the  hiero- 
phants  who  celebrate  its  mysteries.  They  are  the 
channel  of  spiritual  intercourse  between  heaven  and 
earth.  If  men  would  approach  God  acceptably,  they 
must  do  it  through  them.  If  they  would  obtain  re- 
newing and  sanctifying  grace,  they  must  receive  the 
sacraments  at  their  hands.  They,  and  they  alone, 
have  the  "  gift  of  the  holy  ghost."  They  are  the 
"stewards"  of  the  "storehouse  of  grace,"  the  Church; 
and  this  grace  it  is  their  prerogative  to  dispense  in 
baptism  and  the  Lord's  Supper.  God  is  a  merciful 
being,  and  mai/  save  one  who  through  "  involuntary 
error"  refuses  to  submit  to  their  authority;  but  no 
man  can  reasonably  expect  to  be  saved  who  does  this. 
In  so  far  as  His  "covenant"  is  concerned,  mankind 
must  look  to  them  and  the  sacraments  as  they  admin- 
ister them,  as  the  only  avenue  through  which  they 
can  obtain  renewal,  reconciliation  to  God,-the  indwell- 
ing of  the  Spirit,  and  a  title  to  eternal  life. 

No  set  of  men  can  fancy  themselves  invested  with 
such  powers  as  these  without  being  puffed  up  by  it. 
This  effect  has  uniformly  followed,  and  followed  just 
in  the  degree  in  which  it  has  been  found  practicable 
to  secure  a  recognition  of  the  claim  on  the  part  of  the 
people.  It  was  the  gradual  assumption  of  these 
spiritual  prerogatives,  which  led  to  the  establishment 
of  that  proud  and  oppressive  Hierarchy  whose  usur- 
pations and  crimes  make  up  so  large  a  portion  of  the 
history  of  the  civilized  world  for  the  last  twelve  cen- 
turies. The  same  spirit  in  England  forged  the  chains 
of  the  Puritans,  and  in  Scotland  shed  the  blood  of  the 
Covenanters  like  water.  In  this  country,  it  has  dis- 
closed itself  in  the  more  frequent  and  unscrupulous 


284  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

avowal  of  the  dogma  tliat  "  there  cannot  be  a  Church 
without  a  Bishop,"  in  a  growing  sycophancy  on  the 
part  of  many  of  the  inferior  clergy  towards  their 
Bishops,  in  the  glorification  of  the  "  Church"  at  the 
expense  of  its  adorable  Head,  in  the  application  of  the 
term  "Dissenters"  and  other  offensive  epithets,  to 
Non-Episcopalians,  in  the  assumption  by  Higli-Church 
Bishops  of  new  prerogatives  and  the  inculcation  of 
the  doctrines  of  implicit  faith  and  passive  obedience 
upon  the  laity,  and  in  many  other  ways  no  less  sig- 
nificant. These  are  the  natural,  and,  without  a  mira- 
cle, unavoidable  fruits  of  a  system  which  teaches  the 
few  hundred  Episcopal  ministers  in  the  United  Stales, 
to  regard  themselves  and  the  Roman  Catholic  clergy, 
as  the  only  channel  through  which  the  eighteen  mil- 
lions of  people  who  make  up  this  nation,  can  have 
any  "covenanted"  access  to  God.  And  just  in  pro- 
portion as  these  extravagant  pretensions  come  to  be 
acquiesced  in,  will  these  and  similar  effects  follow — 
all  tending  to  one  result,  the  aggrandizement  of 

THE  PRELATICAL  CLERGY. 

With  this  tendency  there  is,  in  the  scheme  we  are 
examining,  associated  another,  which  forms  its  coun- 
terpart, viz.  THE  GRADUAL  SUBSTITUTION  OF  A  CERE- 
MONIAL FOR  A  SPIRITUAL  RELIGION. 

It  is  a  great  mistake  to  suppose  that  men  are  na- 
turally averse  to  the  principle  of  Hierarchism.  "The 
truth  is,"  as  Dr.  Whateley  has  observed,  "  mankind 
have  an  innate  propensity,  as  to  other  errors,  so  to 
that  of  endeavouring  to  serve  God  by  proxy; — to 
commit  to  some  distinct  order  of  men  the  care  of  their 
religious  concerns,  in  the  same  manner  as  they  con- 
fide the  care  of  their  bodily  health  to  the  physician, 
and  of  their  legal  transactions  to  the  lawyer ;  deem- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  285 

mg  it  sufficient  to  follow  implicitly  their  directions, 
without  attempting  themselves  to  become  acquainted 
with  the  mysteries  of  medicine  or  of  law.  Even 
thus  are  they  willing  and  desirous  that  others  should 
study,  and  should  understand  the  mysterious  doctrines 
of  religion  in  their  stead — should  practise  in  their 
stead  some  more  exalted  kind  of  piety  and  of  virtue — 
and  should  offer  prayers  and  sacrifices  on  their  be- 
half, both  in  their  lifetime  and  after  their  death.  For 
man,  except  when  unusually  depraved,  retains  enough 
of  the  image  of  his  Maker,  to  have  a  natural  rever- 
ence for  religion,  and  a  desire  that  God  should  be 
worshipped,  but,  through  the  corruption  of  his  nature, 
his  heart  is  (except  when  divinely  purified)  too  much 
alienated  from  God  to  take  delight  in  serving  him. 
Hence  the  disposition  men  have  ever  shown,  to  sub- 
stitute the  devotion  of  the  priest  for  their  own  ; — to 
leave  the  duties  of  piety  in  his  hands — and  to  let  him 
serve  God  in  their  stead.  This  disposition  is  not  so 
much  the  consequence,  as  itself  the  origin,  of  priest- 
craft. The  Romish  hierarchy  did  but  take  advantage 
from  time  to  time  of  this  natural  propensity,  by 
engrafting  successively  on  its  system  such  practices 
and  points  of  doctrine  as  favoured  it,  and  which  were 
naturally  converted  into  a  source  of  profit  and  influ- 
ence to  the  priesthood.  Hence  the  gradual  transfor- 
mation of  the  Christian  minister — the  presbyter — into 
the  sacrificing  priest,  the  hiereus,  (in  Latin,  *'  sacer- 
dos;"  as  the  Romanists  call  theirs,)  of  the  Jewish 
and  Pagan  religions."^ 

The   High-Church  system  is  fitted  to  gratify  this 
perverse  craving  of  the  unrenewed  heart  after  a  "vi- 

'  The  Errors  of  Romanism  traced  to  their  origin  in  Human  Na- 
ture,  chap.  ii. 


286  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

carious  religion."  If  the  ministry  be  what  this  system 
represents  it — if  the  Church  is  the  "storehouse  of 
grace" — if  "  the  gifts  of  grace  are  deposited  in  mere 
positive  ordinances,"  as  distinguished  from  prayer, 
preaching,  "  lohat  is  called,  communion  with  God," 
and  the  hke — and  if  all  who  receive  the  sacraments 
at  the  hands  of  persons  duly  commissioned,  do,  (unless 
there  be  some  actual  moral  impediment  in  their  own 
minds  at  the  time)  thereby  receive  spiritual  life, — it 
will  be  miraculous  if  the  mass  of  the  people  who  are 
brought  under  the  influence  of  this  system,  shall  be 
kept  from  making  the  priest  their  proxy,  and  com- 
mitting their  salvation  into  his  hands.  ^ 

The  disposition  which  leads  men  to  trust  in  a  priest 
for  salvation,  prompts  to  the  multiplication  of 
RITES  AND  CEREMONIES.  Thc  two  thiugs  arc  branches 
of  the  same  tree,  and  are  never  long  separated.  When- 
ever the  mind  is  diverted  from  spiritual  religion,  it 
seeks  repose  in  forms. .  And  it  matters  comparatively 
little  what  the  forms  are.  Christianity  has  its  symbols 
and  ceremonies;  but  they  are  few  and  simple.  Its 
Divine  Author  "knew"  too  well  "what  was  in  man," 
to  infold  the  sublime  truths  of  his  religion  in  a  pomp- 

»  The  following  anecdote  will  not  be  deemed  out  of  place  in  illus- 
trating  this  feature  of  the  High-Church  system. 

Matthew  Mead,  the  eminent  non-conformist,  was  politely  addressed 
by  a  nobleman — "  I  am  sorry,  sir,  that  we  have  not  a  person  of  your 
abilities  with  us  in  the  Established  Church.  They  would  be  exten- 
sively  useful  there."  ♦'  You  don't,  my  lord,  require  persons  of  great 
abilities  in  the  Establishment."  "Why  so,  sir;  what  do  you  mean?" 
"When  you  christen  a  child,  you  regenerate  it  by  the  Holy  Ghost. 
When  you  confirm  a  youth,  you  assure  him  of  God's  favour  and  the 
forgiveness  of  his  sins.  When  you  visit  a  sick  person,  you  absolve 
him  from  all  his  iniquities :  and  when  you  bury  the  dead,  you  send 
them  all  to  heaven.  Of  what  particular  service,  then,  can  great 
abilities  be  in  your  communion?" 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  2S7 

ous  ceremonial.  He  did  this  under  the  ancient  econo- 
my, because  that  economy,  as  being  a  mere  prepara- 
tory dispensation,  was  designed  to  subserve  certain 
important  purposes  which  required  an  imposing  and 
compUcated  apparatus  of  ritual  observances.  But 
when  *'  Ufe  and  immortahty  were  brought  to  hght," 
when  the  "  True  Light"  appeared  in  the  world,  these 
shadows  and  emblems  were  laid  aside.  Man,  how- 
ever, with  his  strong  predilection  for  the  sensual  in 
place  of  the  spiritual,  in  religion,  has  been  ever  since 
trying  to  bring  them  back.  Christianity  has  had  to 
struggle,  from  its  commencement,  against  persevering 
exertions  on  the  part  of  professed  friends,  to  reduce  it 
to  its  former  servitude.  This  contest  has  been  waged 
in  every  Christian  communion — .the  elements  of  it 
are  in  every  man's  breast.  In  the  Greek  and  Ro- 
man Churches,  "the  son  of  the  bond  woman"  has 
triumphed  over  the  free;  Mount  Zion  has  given  place 
to  Mount  Sinai ;  the  priest  has  usurped  his  Master's 
crown;  and  the  deluded  people  have  "turned  again 
to  the  weak  and  beggarly  elements"  from  which  they 
had  escaped.  Puseyism  is  successfully  carrying  on 
the  same  conflict.  It  is  hastening  towards  Rome  just 
as  fast  as  a  wise  jiolicy,  and  rather  faster  than  a 
becoming  regard  to  the  solemnity  of  oaths  and  sub- 
scriptions, will  permit.  Even  in  the  Episcopal  Church 
in  this  country,  a  candidate  has  been  jecently  adpnit- 
ted  to  Deacon's  orders,  who  on  his  examination 
declared  that  he  "deemed  the  differences  between 
us  [i.  e.  the  Episcopal  Church]  and  Rome,  such 
as  embraced  no  points  of  faith — doubted  whether 
the  Church  of  Rome  or  the  Anglican  Church  were 
the  more  pure — considered  the  Reformation  from 
Rome  unjustifiable,  and  followed  by  grievous  and 


288  THE    HIGH-CHURCn    DOCTRINE    OF 

lamentable  results,  though  not  without  others  of  an 
opposite  character — faulted  not  the  Church  of  Rome 
for  reading  the  Apocrypha  for  proof  of  doctrine — 
did  not  consider  that  we  were  bound  to  receive  tlie 
XXXIX  Articles  of  our  Church,  in  any  close  and 
rigid  construction  of  the  same — declared  that  he  knew 
not  how  to  answer  the  question,  which  had  been  re- 
peatedly asked,  Whether  he  considered  the  Church  of 
Rome  to  be  now  in  error  in  matters  of  faith? — was 
not  prepared  to  pronounce  th6  doctrine  of  transub- 
stantiation  an  absurd  or  impossible  doctrine,  and  re- 
garded it,  as  taught  withhi  the  last  hundred  years,  as 
possibly  meaning  no  more  than  we  mean  by  the  doc- 
trine of  the  Real  Presence — did  not  object  to  the  Ro- 
mish doctrine  of  Purgatory,  as  defined  by  the  Council 
of  Trent — believed  that  the  state  of  the  soul  after 
death,  was  one  in  which  it  could  be  benefited  by  the 
prayers  of  the  faithful  and  the  sacrifice  of  the  altar — 
regarded  the  denial  of  the  cup  to  the  laity  as  a  severe 
act  of  discipline  only — justified  the  invocation  of 
saints — in  one  instance  declared  that  he  did  not  deny, 
but  would  not  positively  affirm,  the  decrees  of  the 
Council  of  Trent ;  in  another,  that  he  received  the 
Articles  of  the  Creed  of  Pius  IV.,  so  far  as  they  were 
repetitions  of  the  decrees  of  that  Council." ^  With 
the  fact  before  us,  that  a  man  avowing  these  senti- 
ments has  been  ordained  by  an  Episcopal  Prelate,  it 
would  be  superfluous  to  argue  on  the  tendencies  of 
High-Churchism  to  smother  the  vital  spirit  of  Chris- 
tianity, as  Rome  has  done,  with  a  load  of  human  in- 
ventions and  idle  ceremonies.     How  far  the  school 

I  Drs.  Smith  and  Anthon's  "  Statement  of  Facts  in  relation  to  the 
recent  ordination  [of  Mr.  Carey]  in  St.  Stephen's  Church,  New  York," 
p.  27. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  2S9 

have  advanced  in  this  direction,  on  the  other  side  of 
the  water,  may  be  learned  from  one  of  themselves, 
who  seems  to  be  astounded  at  the  discovery  he  has 
but  lately  made,  that  Puseyism  leads  naturally  to 
Popery.  Alarmed  at  the  rapid  strides  his  fellow- 
Tractarians  and  their  disciples  are  making  towards 
Rome,  the  writer  in  question ^  has  published  a  pam- 
phlet, disclosing  a  good  many  interesting  facts  respect- 
ing the  progress  of  the  Oxford  views. 

"The  blame  of  separation,  (he  says,)  of  schism,  is 
[among  the  Tractarians]  openly  and  unscrupulously 
laid  on  the  English  Church." 

"  Invocation  of  saints  is  sanctioned  in  some  quar- 
ters; purgatory  is  by  no  means  unacceptable  in  others; 
images  and  crucifixes  are  purchased  and  employed  to 
aid  in  private  devotion;  celibacy  of  the  clergy — auri- 
cular confession,  are  acknowledged  to  be  obligatory. '^ 

"  Among  other  evidences  of  a  *  holy  life,^  which 
are  held  up  to  our  admiration,  are  '  the  use  of  shirts 
of  hemjJ,  in  which  the  splinters  of  the  stalk  were 
left;^  the  harbouring  of  vermin ;  the  use  of  ^disgust- 
ing'' food.  It  is  held  questionable,  whether  some 
saints  have  not.  *been  even  marked  externally  by  the 
semblance  of  the  five  adorable  wounds.''  We  are  left 
in  doubt  whether  the  heahng  of  a  young  lady  by  a 
thorn,  ^  said  to  have  been  one  of  those  that  pierced 
our  Saviour,'  was  miraculous  or  not.  It  is  argued, 
however,  that  one  would  naturally  look  for  such  mi- 
raculous events  in  monasteries,  ^  where  persons  take 
the  kingdom  of  heaven  by  violence,  and  begin  on 
earth  the  life  of  angels,  neither  marrying  nor  giving 
in  marriage.' " 

This,  let  it  be  noted,  is  the  testimony  of  one  of  the 

'  The  Rev.  W.  Palmer. 
25 


290  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

leaders.  He  has  been  behind  the  curtain;  and  now, 
alarmed  at  the  follies  he  has  helped  to  introduce, 
makes  his  report  of  the  scenes  that  are  passing  there. 
It  is  safe  to  presume  that  the  loathsome  devices  he 
has  mentioned  for  mortifying  the  flesh,  will  not  very- 
soon  become  jjopular  with  the  school  to  which  he 
belongs;  but  novitiates  are  put  upon  a  milder  regi- 
men. Those  who  are  not  prepared  for  the  "  hempen 
shirts,"  and  the  "  disgusting  food,^'  may  begin  with 
the  sign  of  the  cross — ^'  the  sanctifying  and  perhaps 
half  sacramental  use  of  the  cross,"  as  it  is  expressed 
by  the  Tract-writers.  The  wonderful  efficacy  of  this 
slight  manipulation,  in  exciting  good  thoughts  and 
putting  to  flight  evil  spirits,  is  thus  delineated  by  one 
of  them. 

"  Whene'er  across  this  sinful  flesh  of  mine 

I  draw  the  Holy  Sign^ 
All  good  thoughts  stir  within  me,  and  collect 

Their  slumb'ring  strength  divine  ; 
Till  there  springs  up  that  hope  of  God's  elect, 

My  faith  shall  ne'er  be  wrecked. 

And  who  shall  say,  but  hateful  spirits  around 

For  their  brief  hour  unbound, 
Shudder  to  see,  and  wail  their  overthrow  ? 

While  on  far  heathen  ground 
Some  lonely  saint  hails,  the  fresh  odour,  though 

Its  source  he  cannot  know."' 

No  man  can  stop  here.  He  who  has  learned  to 
ascribe  such  marvels  as  these  to  the  mere  ^'  crossing" 
of  himself,  is  prepared  to  expend  upon  trifles  the 
reverence  which  belongs  to  the  solemn  realities  of 
religion.     And  accordingly  we  find  in  the  writings  of 

'  Lyra  Apostolica. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  291 

the  sect  a  great  prominence  given  to  every  thing  per- 
taining to  the  exterior  of  reUgion  —  to  Saints' days, 
and  decorations  of  churches,  to  vestments,  and  atti- 
tudes, and  such  Uke  impertinences — while  it  is  rare 
to  meet  with  exhortations  to  personal  hohness,  in  the 
style  of  the  Apostolic  Epistles,  The  sort  of  Chris- 
tianity which  the  system  fosters,  lays  out  its  strength 
upon  externals.  It  is  not  that  it  lacks  emotion,  but 
its  strongest  emotions  are  excited  by  insignificant 
objects.  "The  venerable  fathers  of  the  Church  of 
England,'^  says  a  masterly  writer,  "were  familiar 
with  the  exercises  of  holy  joy  and  godly  sorrow.  But 
their  joy  sprang  from  the  sense  of  Divine  favour,  and 
their  sorrow  from  the  sense  of  their  own  sin.  The 
one  was  never  higher,  and  the  other  never  deeper, 
than  at  those  times  when  external  forms  were  hidden 
from  their  view  by  the  superior  brightness  of  the 
spiritual  objects  which  they  merely  represented.  When 
they  wept,  it  was  not  because  the  pulpit  was  too  high 
above  the  reading-desk.  When  they  exulted,  it  was 
not  because  the  altar  had  been  thrust  back  to  the  east 
end  of  the  chancel.  When  they  repented,  it  was  not 
because  they  had  tasted  goose  on  Friday.  ^  When 
they  thanked  God,  it  was  not  for  bells  and  organs  and 
baptismal  fonts.  Their  communion  was  with  God 
and  with  his  Son  directly,  not  circuitously  through  a 
line  of  Priests  or  Bishops.  Their  delight  was  in  the 
word  of  God  itself,  not  in  the  spread-eagle  upon 
which  it  rested.  The  graces  which  distinguished 
them  were  not  those  of  a  posture-master.  The  cross 
in  which  they  gloried,  was  the  cross  of  Christ,  and  not 
that  of  the  carpenter,  the  gilder,  or  the  silversmith. 
They  kept  it  at  the  bottom  of  their  hearts,  and  not 

J  See  Mr.  Froude's  Remains. 


292  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

upon  the  tops  of  their  houses.  In  a  word,  they  walked 
by  faith  ,and  not  by  sight,  looking  not  at  things  wliich 
are  seen,  but  at  things  which  are  unseen.  And  yet 
now,  their  ApostoUcal  Successors  use  the  very  same 
expressions,  in  relation  to  their  baubles  and  their 
mummeries,  which  these  old  worthies  used  in  refer- 
ence to  spiritual  and  eternal  objects.  What  they  said 
of  the  foundation,  their  successors  say  of  the  wood, 
hay,  and  stubble  heaped  upon  it.''  ^ 

This  is  the  process  so  much  to  be  dreaded  from  the 
prevalence  of  High-Churchism.  The  whole  tendency 
of  the  system  is  to  substitute  a  mere  outward  Chris- 
tianity for  true  religion — to  put  the  Church  in  the 
place  of  Christ,  and  rites  and  forms  in  the  place  of 
regeneration  by  the  Holy  Spirit  and  justification 
through  the  righteousness  of  Christ.  This  is  only 
saying  in  other  words,  that  its  tendency  is  to  delude 
men  and  destroy  their  souls — a  result  that  may  be 
expected  to  follow  wherever  the  system  is  allowed  to 
exert  its  legitimate  influence  without  obstruction. 


CHAPTER  XL 


INTOLERANCE    OF    THE    SYSTEM. 

The  Intolerance  of  High-Churchism  has  been  fre- 
quently adverted  to  in  former  chapters,  but  I  cannot 
consent  to  dismiss  it  without  a  further  notice. 

Ample  evidence  has  already  been  adduced   that 
the  unchurching  dogma  constitutes  a  radical  part  of 

1  Bib.  Repertory,  Vol.  XIV.  135.       . 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  293 

the  system.  There  was  a  ti-me  when  this  dogma  was 
unknown  in  the  Church  of  England.  The  Enghsh 
Reformers  and  many  of  the  illustrious  men  who  suc- 
ceeded them,  cordially  acknowledged  the  Presbyteri- 
an Churches  of  the  continent  as  true  churches.  They 
contented  themselves  with  the  doctrine  that  Prelacy 
was  authorized  by  the  Bible — that  it  was  exclusively 
authorized,  they  neither  asserted  nor  believed.  They 
held  that  Bishops  and  Presbyters  were  properly  of 
one  order;  and  that  the  investiture  of  Bishops  with 
certain  exclusive  functions,  was  a  matter  of  expedi- 
ency and  human  arrangement.  This  is  so  well  known 
that  no  one  versed  in  English  ecclesiastical  history, 
will  question  it.^  On  one  part  of  the  statement,  how- 
ever, I  may  be  permitted  to  quote  the  testimony  of 
the  present  excellent  and  able  Bishop  of  the  Diocese 
of  Ohio,  from  a  pamphlet  written  some  years  ago 
when  he  was  Chaplain  at  West  Point. 

"  Is  it  characteristic  of  a  Loiv-Churchman  that  he 
does  not  believe  in  the  exclusive  divine  right  of 
Episcopacy;  that  he  does  not  deny  the  validity  of  all 
ordinations  which  have  not  been  performed  by  a 
Bishop;  that  lie  cannot  consider  all  those  Christian 
brethren  who  do  not  receive  the  sacraments  from 
ministers  Episcopally  ordained,  as  destitute  of  the 
sacraments  of  the  gospel,  and  that  he  finds  it  neither 
in  the  Bible,  the  doctrines  of  the  Church,  nor  in 
his  own  heart,  to  give  up  all  his  brethren,  who  are 
not  partakers  of  ordinances  Episcopally  administer- 
ed, to  nothing  more  comforting  nor  scriptural  than 
what  are  called  by  some  regarded  as  High-Church- 
men, "  uncovenanted  mercies  ?"  If  so,  then  Mr, 
M.  is  very  free   to   own  that  in   all  these  particu- 

»  See  Chapter  VI. 

25* 


294  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

lars,  he  is  "one  of  the  most  decided  of  Low-Church- 
men." But  is  there  any  reason  to  be  timid  of  such 
an  acknowledgment  while  our  Church,  by  saying  not 
a  syllable  upon  either  of  these  points  in  her  Liturgy, 
Catechism,  Articles,  or  Homilies,  has  given  ample 
room  for  difference  of  opinion  ?  As  for  the  exclusive 
divine  right  of  Episcopacy,  Mr.  M.  has  never  cared 
to  conceal  that  he  does  not  believe  it;  and  why  should 
he  care  to  conceal  his  opinion  when,  on  the  testi- 
mony of  such  historians  as  Warner  and  Mosheim, 
"Archbishop  Bancroft  was  the  first  man  in  the 
Church  of  England,  who  preached  up  the  divine 
right  of  Episcopacy;"  when  Bishop  Stillingfleet  has 
not  scrupled  to  call  the  jus  divinum,  "  a  novel  pre- 
tence ;"  when  such  men  as  Cranmer,  Jewell,  Hooker, 
Whitgift,  Hall,  Usher,  Burnet,  Tillotson,  Wake,  Pret- 
timan,  and  "a  cloud  of  witnesses"  besides,  have  ex- 
pressed opinions  directly  at  variance  w^ith  the  notion 
of  exclusive  divine  right ;  and  finally,  when  in  a 
pamphlet  published  some  years  ago  by  Bishop  White, 
["Case  of  the  Episcopal  Churches  in  the  United 
States  considered,"]  and  of  which  in  1820  he  said  in 
his  "Memoirs,"  that  "there  did  not  appear  to  his 
mind  any  reason  to  retract  the  leading  sentiments  of 
that  performance,"  we  meet  the  following  paragraph: 
"  Now,  if  even  those  who  hold  Episcopacy  to  be  of 
divine  right,  conceive  the  obligation  of  it  not  to  be 
binding  when  that  idea  would  be  destructive  of  pub- 
lic worship;  much  more  must  they  think  so,  who 
indeed  venerate  and  prefer  that  form  as  the  most  an- 
cient and  eligible,  but  without  any  idea  of  divine 
right  in  the  case.  This  the  author  believes  to  be 
the  sentiment  of  the  great  body  of  Episcopalians  in 
America ;  in  which  respect  they  have  in  their  favour 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  295 

unquestionably  the  sense  of  the  Church  of  England; 
and,  as  he  beUeves,  the  opinions  of  her  most  distin- 
guished Prelates  for  piety,  virtue,  and  ability." 

As  to  the  validity  of  the  orders,  ministry,  and  sacra- 
ments, of  all  churches  destitute  of  Episcopal  organiza- 
tion, Mr.  M.  ought  assuredly  to  have  no  hesitation  in 
owning  that  he  is  neither  able  nor  disposed  to  deny 
it,  when,  besides  the  inferences  which  may  be  drawn 
from  what  has  just  been  mentioned,  such  a  man  as 
Bishop  Hall  asserts,  that  "  all  (in  his  day)  professed 
to  believe  the  mode  of  constituting  the  external  min- 
istry, not  to  be  an  essential  of  the  Church  ;'^  when 
such  a  man  as  Archbishop  Usher  writes, "  for  the  tes- 
tifying of  my  communion  with  these  churches  (Non- 
Episcopal  churches  of  the  continent)  which  I  do  love 
and  honour  as  true  members  of  the  church  universal, 
I  do  profess  that  with  like  affection,  I  should  receive 
the  blessed  sacrament  at  the  hands  of  the  Dutch  min- 
isters, if  I  were  in  Holland,  as  I  should  do  at  the 
hands  of  the  French  ministers,  if  I  were  in  Charen- 
ton  ;"  and  especially,  when  an  Archbishop  of  Canter- 
bury, and  such  an  one  as  Wake,  is  remembered  to 
have  written  as  follows  :  "  The  Reformed  Churches, 
though  differing  in  some  things  from  the  English,  I 
freely  embrace.  I  could  wish  indeed  that  a  well- 
moderated  Episcopal  government,  freed  from  all  un- 
just domination,  such  as  obtains  among  us,  and,  if  I 
have  any  skill  in  such  subjects,  was  received  in  the 
Church  from  the  very  age  of  the  Apostles,  had  been 
retained  by  them  all.  Nor  do  I  despair,  though  I 
should  not  see  it  restored,  that  posterity  will.  In  the 
meantime,  far  be  it  that  on  account  of  such  a  defect, 
(for  so,  without  uncharitablencss,  it  may  be  called,)  I 
should  be  of  such  an  iron  heart  as  to  think  that  any 


296  THE    HIGH-CHUR€H    DOCTRINE    OP 

of  them  should  be  cut  off  from  the  communion  of  the 
Church ;  or  with  certain  furious  writers  among  us 
should  pronounce  that  they  have  no  true  and  valid 
sacraments  and  so  are  scarcely  Christians.''^ '^ 

Had  these  sentiments  continued  to  prevail  in  the 
Church  of  England,  the  controversy  which  is  now 
going  on  would  not  have  occurred.  That  Episco- 
palians should  regard  the  absence  of  Prelacy  as  a 
defect  in  Non-Episcopal  Churches,  is  a  thing  of  course. 
We  look  upon  its  existence  in  their  system  as  a  "  de- 
fect,'^ and  believe  they  would  be  far  better  off  with- 
out it.  These  opinions  are  quite  compatible  with 
the  maintenance  of  Christian  fellowship.  But  the 
present  High-Church  party  have  gone  to  the  length 
of  denouncing  the  whole  Non-Episcopal  body  as 
being  out  of  covenant  with  God,  because  they  have 
not  that  unbroken  Prelatical  succession  which  they, 
with  so  little  warrant,  lay  claim  to  themselves,  "  We 
cannot,"  says  one  of  them^  in  a  late  lecture,  "be 
brought  into  the  holy  covenant,  except  in  an  Epis- 
copal Church,  or  by  the  agency  of  an  Episcopal  min- 
istry." "'  The  supposed  commission"  of  Non-Epis- 
copal ministers,  "  is  worse  than  a  nullity.  It  involves 
the  guilt  of  schism  and  rebellion.  They  assume 
powers  that  were  never  granted  to  them,  and  exer- 
cise those  powers  not  only  independently  of  the  di- 
vine authority  which  the  Saviour  and  his  Apostles 
transmitted  to  their  successors  in  the  government  of 
the  Church,  but  in  direct  opposition  to  that  authority." 

1  Reply  to  Dr.  (now  Bishop)  II.  U.  Onderdonk,  p.  13—15,  Sec 
numerous  additional  testimonies  to  the  same  effect,  exhibiting  (inter 
alia)  the  oblig-ations  of  the  Church  of  England  to  Luther  and  Calvin, 
in  the  pamphlet  already  mentioned,  entitled,  "  Oxford  Divinity,  by  a 
Presbyterian." — Burlington,  New  Jersey,  1843. 

2  The  Rev.  Palmer  Dyer,  of  Whitehall,  N.  Y. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  297 

This  modest  preacher  is  one  of  a  large  and  growing 
number  who  are  fomenting  strife  in  the  bosom  of  the 
Episcopal  Church,  and  making  themselves  ridiculous 
by  their  arrogant  pretensions.  A  late  writer  in  the 
Edinburgh  Review  has  described  the  genus  very 
graphically.  "The  country/^  he  says,  "is  infested 
by  not  a  few  young  ^ priests^  raving  about  their 
Apostolic  Succession;  founding  the  most  absurd  pre- 
tensions on  their  mere  sacerdotal  character,  though 
backed  neither  by  experience  nor  wisdom;  boasting 
of  the  thaumaturgic  powers  they  can  exert  in  the 
administration  of  the  sacraments;  contending  not  for 
the  faith  once  delivered  to  the  saints,  but  for  wax 
candles,  altar-cloths,  chaplets,  crosses,  crucifixes,  and 
mummery  of  all  kinds; — at  the  same  time  modestly 
consigning  all  Protestants  out  of  the  Episcopal  pale, 
either  to  perdition  or  the  *  uncovenanted  mercies ;'  m 
a  word,  exhibiting  zeal  indeed,  but  zeal  that  is  utterly 
unacquainted  with  any  other  of  the  Christian  graces 
— zeal  that  is  not  even  on  speaking  terms  with  know- 
ledge, faith,  or  charity.'' ^ 

The  intolerance  of  this  party  is  aggravated  by 
several  considerations  which  deserve  to  be  men- 
tioned here.  One  of  these,  is,  that  the  system  in 
behalf  of  which  this  intolerance  is  exercised,  was 
originally  established  by  the  civil  jjower,  in  opposi- 
tion to  the  principles  and  wishes  of  the  wisest  and 
best  men  in  the  Church.  I  refer  in  this  language  to 
the  English  Reformation  and  the  Church  of  England. 
I  have  no  intention  of  charging  the  sins  or  imperfec- 
tions of  the  English  hierarchy  upon  the  Episcopal 
Church  in  this  country.  Bat  that  Church  was  con- 
fessedly the  mother,  and,  in  respect  to  its  general 

1  No.  156,  p.  290. 


298  THE    HIGH-CHURCII    DOCTRINE    OF 

polity,  ceremonies,  and  worship,  the  model,  of  this. 
High-Churchism  too,  is  essentially  the  same  spirit  on 
both  sides  the  Atlantic.  It  is,  therefore,  quite  appro- 
priate to  the  object  of  this  discussion,  to  show  that 
th€  system  of  order  and  worship  which  all  men  are 
now  called  upon  to  adopt  under  penalty  of  being 
abandoned  to  "  uncovenanted  mercy,"  was  a  crea- 
ture OF  THE  STATE,  uot  a  system  deduced  by  pious 
and  learned  divines  from  the  Scriptures  of  truth. 

It  was  the  common  sentiment  of  the  English  Re- 
formers, that  their  Church  was  only  partially  re- 
formed^ both  as  to  polity  and  worship.  They  strug- 
gled long  and  hard  to  free  it  from  the  "clerical  habits" 
and  many  rights  and  usages  which  had  been  retained 
from  the  Church  of  Rome.  But  the  authority,  first 
of  a  sensual  king,  and  then  of  a  vain,  despotic,  ca- 
pricious queen,  was  against  them  ;  and  their  struggle 
was  ^fruitless.  "We  should  mistake  exceedingly,  if 
we  supposed  that  they  were  men  of  the  same  prin- 
ciples and  temper  with  many  who  succeeded  to  their 
places,  or  that  they  were  satisfied  with  the  pitch  to 
which  they  had  carried  the  Reformation  of  the  Eng- 
lish Church,  and  regarded  it  as  a  paragon  and  perfect 
pattern  to  other  Churches.  They  were  strangers  to 
those  extravagant  and  illiberal  notions  which  were 
afterwards  adopted  by  the  fond  admirers  of  the  hier- 
archy and  liturgy.  They  would  have  laughed  at  the 
man  who  seriously  asserted,  that  the  ecclesiastical 
ceremonies  constituted  any  part  of  "the  beauty  of 
holiness,"  or  that  the  imposhion  of  the  hands  of  a 
Bishop  was  essential  to  the  validity  of  ordination ; 
and  they  would  not  have  owned  that  person  as  a 
Protestant  who  would  have  ventured  to  insinuate, 
that  where  these  were  wanting,  there  was  no  Chris- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  299 

tian  ministry,  no  ordinances,  no  Church,  and  perhaps 
— no  salvation.  Many  things  which  their  successors 
have  applauded,  they  barely  tolerated ;  and  they 
would  have  been  happy  if  the  circumstances  of  their 
time,  would  have  permitted  them  to  introduce  altera- 
tions which  have  since  been  cried  down  as  puritani- 
cal innovations.  Strange  as  it  may  appear  to  some, 
I  am  not  afraid  of  exceeding  the  truth  when  I  say, 
that  if  the  English  Reformers,  including  the  Protes- 
tant Bishops,  had  been  left  to  their  own  choice, — if 
they  had  not  been  held  back  and  retarded  by  a  large 
mass  of  popishly  affected  clergy  in  the  reign  of  Ed- 
ward, and  restrained  by  the  supreme  civil  author- 
ity on  the  accession  of  Elizabeth,  they  ivould  have 
brought  the  government  and  luorship  of  the  Church 
of  England  nearly  to  the  }'> utter n  of  other  Reformed 
Churches.^^'^ 

Those  who  may  wish  to  see  the  authorities  on 
which  this  representation  rests,  will  find  them  in  the 
appendix  to  the  work  just  quoted.  Many  of  them 
are  to  be  found  also  in  Neal's  History  of  the  Puritans, 
Burnet's  Reformation,  and  the  "Zurich  Letters"  late- 
ly published  by  the  "Parker  Society,"  and  containing 
the  correspondence  between  the  English  Reformers 
and  the  Divines  of  Switzerland.  From  these  sources 
I  make  a  i^ew  selections. 

Hooper,  in  a  letter  dated  February  8, 1550,  informs 
BuUinger,  that  "the  Archbishop  of  Canterbury,  the 
Bishops  of  Rochester,  Ely,  St.  David's,  Lincoln,  and 
Bath,  were  sincerely  bent  on  advancing  the  purity  of 
doctrine,  agreeing  in  all  things  with  the  Helvetic 
Churches."  Parkhurst,  Bishop  of  Norwich,  writing 
to  Gualter,  February  4,  1573,  exclaims,  "0!  would 

1  Dr.  McCrie:  Life  of  Knox,  p.  65.  (Lond,  1841.) 


300  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

to  God,  would  to  God,  once  at  last,  all  the  English 
people  would  in  good  earnest  propound  to  themselves 
to  follow  the  [Presbyterian]  Church  of  Zurich  as  the 
most  absolute  pattern."  It  was  proposed  by  Cranmer 
to  erect  courts  similar  to  the  kirk-sessions  and  pro- 
vincial synods  afterwards  introduced  into  the  Scotch 
Church.^ 

Elizabeth,  who  had  the  chief  agency  in  shaping 
the  pohty  and  worship  of  the  Church  and  settling  it 
on  its  present  basis,  seemed  disposed  to  retain  just  as 
much  Popery  as  would  comport  with  the  peace  of 
her  kingdom,  or,  as  Bishop  Short  has  expressed  it, 
she  "  was  not  indisposed  to  have  approached  as  near 
as  possible  to  the  Romish  communion."  She  in- 
structed the  divines  whom  she  appointed  to  revise 
King  Edward's  litiugy,  to  omit  all  offensive  pas- 
sages against  the  Pope,  and  to  make  people  easy  about 
the  belief  of  the  corporal  presence  of  Christ  in  the  Eu- 
charist. On  examining  the  litany  as  reported  by  them, 
she  found  .this  passage  : — "  From  the  tyranny  of  the 
Bishop  of  Rome,  and  all  his  detestable  enormities, 
good  liOrd,  deliver  us."  This  she  struck  out;  as  she 
also  did  the  rubric  which  declared  that  "by  kneeling 
at  the  sacrament,  no  adoration  was  intended  to  any 
corporal  presence  of  Christ."  The  divines  had  left  it 
optional  with  the  people  whether  to  receive  the  com- 
munion kneeling  or  standing.  The  Queen  and  Parlia- 
ment {i.  e.  the  civil -power  in  opposition  to  the  spiritual 
officers  of  the  Church,)  "  restrained  it  to  kneeling." ^ 
The  Reformers  were  stoutly  opposed  to  what  they 
regarded  as  "  Popish  habits."  The  Queen,  with  her 
characteristic  love  of  pomp  and  parade,  and  her  cor- 
dial aversion  to  spiritual  religion,  would  not   allow 

>  Burnet,  III.  214.  2  Neal,  I  177. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  301 

the  clergy  the  least  discretion  in  this  matter,  but  en- 
forced the  use  of  the  habits,  with  pains  and  penaUies. 
"  It  was  only  her  strong  Tudor  arm,"  says  an  au- 
thority which  no  High-Churchman  will  discredit, 
"that  kept  them  within  decent  bounds.  The  greater 
part  of  them  positively  objected  to  the  surplice — in- 
cluding Sandys,  Grindal,  Pilkington,  Jewell,  Horn, 
Parkhurst,  Bentham,  and  all  the  leading  men, 
who  were  for  simplifying  our  church  ceremonial 

IN  THAT  AND  OTHER  RESPECTS,  ACCORDING  TO  THE 

Genevan  [z.  e.  the  Presbyterian]  model;  Arch- 
bishop Parker  almost  standing  alone  with  the  Queen 
in  her  determination  to  uphold  the  former."  ^  All 
this  appears  from  their  letters  to  the  continental  min- 
isters. .  Cox  writes  to  Bullinger,  (1551,)  "I  think  all 
things  in  the  Church  ought  to  be  pure  and  simple, 
removed  at  the  greatest  distance  from  the  pomp  and 
elements  of  the  world.  But  in  this  our  Church,  what 
can  I  do  in  so  low  a  station P"^  Jewell,  in  a  letter 
to  Peter  Martyr,  1559,  calls  the  clerical  habits  "a 
stage-dress"  to  which  those  alone  were  attached  who 
"  had  nothing  else  to  recommend  them  to  the  people 
but  a  comical  dress."  He  engages  that  no  exer- 
tions of  his  shall  be  wanting  to  banish  utterly  these 

1  Brit.  Crit.  for  1842,  p.  330.  Courayer,  the  celebrated  Romish 
defender  of  the  Anglican  Ordinations,  makes  a  similar  statement 
respecting  Cranmer  and  Barlow,  and  others,  in  the  reign  of  Edward. 
After  saying  that  in  their  answers  to  the  questions  proposed  to  cer- 
tain divines,  these  dignitaries  "exclude  ordination  particularly  from 
the  number  of  the  sacraments,  as  carrying  no  virtual  efficacy  with 
it,"  he  adds — "  In  a  word,  pure  Presbvterianism  without  disguise, 
discovers  itself  in  all  the  answers ;  and  it  is  but  too  apparent  that 
the  chief  aim  of  these  divines  and  Prelates  was  to  extinguish  Epis- 
copacy." 

2  Cited  by  McCrie,  p.  409. 

26 


302  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

"ridiculous  trifles'^  {^'ludicris  hieptiis''^)  and  *^ relics 
of  the  Amorites."  And  at  a  later  period  (1566)  he 
writes  to  Bulhnger,  that  "he  wished  that  the  very 
slightest  footsteps  of  Popery  might  be  removed  out 
of  the  Church  and  minds  of  men;  but  the  Queen 
would  at  that  time  suffer  no  change  in  religion."^ 
Bishops  Grindal  ancl  Horn,  in  writing  to  BulUngei* 
and  Gualter,  Feb.  6th,  1567,  argue  that  the  min- 
isters of  the  Church  of  England  "may  adopt  with- 
out impiety"  the  prescribed  habits,  and  regret  that 
the  question  should  have  been  invested  with  so  much 
importance.  Still,  they  declare  that  they  are  firmly 
opposed  to  the  use  of  the  habits,  and  would  abolish 
them  if  they  could.  "  We  call  Almighty  God  to  wit- 
ness," they  say,  "  that  this  dissension  has  not  been 
occasioned  by  any  fault  of  ours,  nor  is  it  owing  to  us 
that  vestments  of  this  kind  have  not  been  altogether 
done  away  with:  so  far  from  it,  that  we  most  solemn- 
ly make  oath  that  we  have  hitherto  laboured  .with 
all  earnestness,  fidelity,  and  diligence  to  eifect  what 
our  brethren  require  and  what  we  ourselves  wish."^ 
Among  the  leading  advocates  of  a  more  thorough 
reform,  were  Sampson  and  Humphreys,  who,  says 
Burnet,  "  were  much  distinguished  for  their  learning, 
piety,  and  zeal,  in  religion,  and  were  in  great  reputa- 
tion, particularly  in  the  University  of  Oxford,  where 
one  was  Dean  of  Christ's  Church,  and  the  other  Presi- 
dent of  Magdalen's  and  divinity  professor." ^  i^  a 
letter  to  Bullinger,  dated  July  1566,  these  eminent 
men  go  into  an  ingenious  and  able  argument  to  show 
that  the  question  respecting  ceremonies  and  habits, 
was  one  of  great  practical  importance.     We  do  not, 

•  Cited  by  McCrie,  p.  410.  3  Vol.  III.  462. 

2  Zurich  Letters  p.  177, 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.^  303 

they  say,  "place  religion  in  dress:"  but  "as  ceremo- 
nies and  sacerdotal  habits  are  signs  of  religion  and 
marks  of  profession,  they  are  not  of  a  civil  character; 
and  being  borrowed  from  our  adversaries,  as  all  allow 
them  to  be,  they  cannot  be  convenient;  and  being 
marked  with  the  divine  anathema,  and  detested  by 
all  godly  persons,  and  had  in  honour  by  the  wicked 
and  the  weak;  who  think  that  without  them  we  can 
neither  be  ministers,  nor  that  the  sacraments  can  be 
administered  rightly,  they  neither  can  nor  ought  to 
be  reckoned  among  things  indifferent."  They  resist 
the  imposition  of  the  habits  as  an  infringement  of 
Christian  liberty,  and  as  tending  to  arrest  the  reform  of 
the  Church.  "  We  have  (praised  be  God)  a  doctrine 
pure  and  incorrupt:  why  should  we  go  halting  in  re- 
gard to  divine  worship,  which  is  not  the  least  import- 
ant part  of  religion?  Why  should  we  receive  Christ 
rather  maimed,  than  entire,  and  pure,  and  perfect  ? 
Why  should  we  look  for  precedents  from  our  enemies, 
the  Papists,  and  not  from  you,  our  brethren  of  the 
Reformation  ?  We.  have  the  same  Confession  in  our 
Churches,  the  same  Rule  of  Doctrine  and  Faith ;  why 
should  there  be  so  great  a  dissimilarity  and  discre- 
pancy in  rites  and  ceremonies?  The  thing  signified 
is  the  same;  why  do  the  signs  so  differ  as  to  be  unlike 
yours,  and  to  resemble  those  of  the  Papists  ?  We 
have  the  same  captain  and  leader,  Christ,  why  are 
the  banners  of  the  enemy  set  up  in  our  Churches  ? 
which,  if  we  were  men  of  God,  if  we  were  endued 
with  any  zeal,  we  should  long  since  have  abominated 
and  destroyed."  To  show  BuUinger  that  they  were 
"  not  merely  disputing  about  a  cap  or  a  surplice," 
"  we  send  you  (they  say)  some  straws  and  chips  of 
the  Popish  religion" — that  is,  Popish  rites  and  usages 


304  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

which  still  prevailed  in  the  Church  of  England  and 
the  abolition  of  which  they  were  labouring  to  eifect. 
They  specify  under  this  head,  "  a  kind  of  Popish 
superstition''  in  the  public  services,  the  sign  of  the 
cross  in  baptism,  the  practice  of  licensing  women  to 
administer  baptism,  the  imposition  of  "Popish  habits,'^ 
the  absence  of  discipline,  the  restrictions  upon  "the 
free  liberty  of  preaching,''  trafficking  in  benefices 
and  ecclesiastical  dispensations,  and  various  other 
things. 

The  practices  here  specified  were  offensive  to  the 
friends  of  the  Reformation  generally,  whether  among 
the  Bishops  or  the  inferior  clergy.  In  1562,  a  petition 
was  presented  to  the  lower  house  of  Convocation, 
signed  by  thirty-two  members,  most  of  whom  had 
been  exiles,  and  the  best  men  in  the  kingdom,  praying 
for  alterations  similar  to  those  proposed  by  Sampson 
and  Humphreys.  They  ask  that  kneeling  at  the  com- 
munion may  be  left  discretionary  with  each  Bishop, 
and  that  saints'  days  may  be  abolished,  or  kept  only 
for  public  worship,  with  the  privilege  of  ordinary 
labour  afterwards.  Respecting  the  habits,  they  pray 
"  that  copes  and  surplices  should  be  disused,  and  the 
ministers  made  to  wear  some  comely  and  decent 
garment,  [such  as  the  Geneva  gown,  which  all  the 
early  Puritans  wore,]  and  that  the  ministers  of  the 
word  and  sacrament  be  not  compelled  to  wear  such 
gowns  and  caps  as  the  enemies  of  Christ's  gospel 
have  chosen  to  be  the  special  array  of  their  priest- 
hood." ^  For  this  petition  they  substituted  another, 
specifying  the  most  exceptionable  ceremonies,  and 
praying  for  their  abrogation.     After  much  debate  the 

'  The  clerical  "  habits"  of  that  day  were  much  gayer  than  those 
worn  now. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  305 

vote  was  taken,  and  the  Convocation  decided  by  a 
vote  of  forty-three  to  thirty-five  in  favour  of  granting 
their  petition;  but  when  the  j^roxies  came  to  be  count- 
ed, the  vote  stood  fifty-eight  for  and  fifty-nine  against 
the  petition.  The  ceremonies  were  therefore  retained 
in  the  Church  of  England  by  a  majority  of  one  vote, 
and  that  the  vote  of  an  ahsent  member  who  was  not 
present  to  hear  the  question  discussed.^ 

The  facts  that  have  been  adduced,  show  how  much 
the  Enghsh  Reformers  were  bent  upon  a  fiu'ther 
reformation  of  their  Church.  They  could  make  no 
progress,  however,  against  the  Queen.  The  Pusey- 
ites  gratefully  acknowledge  the  firmness  of  Elizabeth 
in  resisting  and  baffling  their  exertions.  "  Queen 
Ehzabeth,'^  says  one  of  them,  "  with  her  prejudices 
in  favour  of  the  old  religion,  \i.  e.  Popery,]  was 
doubtless  an  instrument  in  the  hand  of  God  for  stop- 
ping the  progress  of  the  Reformation^  ^  That 
Church,  it  has  often  been  said,  only  exchanged  one 
Pope  for  another.  As  it  was  originally  created  and 
fashioned  by  the  civil  power,  so  it  is  to  this  day, 

'  Gualter  opposed  the  doctrine  that  the  English  Reformers  ought 
to  submit  to  the  habits  and  ceremonies  temporarily,  in  the  expecta- 
tion that  a  more  favourable  time  would  soon  occur  for  getting  rid  of 
them.  In  a  letter  dated  Jan.  16,  1559,  he  prophetically  warns  those 
who  suffered  abuses  to  remain  and  strengthen  themselves  in  England, 
that  "  afterwards  they  would  scarcely  be  able  to  eradicate  them  by  all 
their  efforts  and  struggles." 

The  historian.  Fuller,  says  in  his  usual  quaint  way,  that  the 
English  Reformers  "  permitted  ignorant  people  to  retain  some  fond 
customs,  that  they  might  remove  the  most  dangerous  and  destructive 
superstitions;  as  mothers,  to  get  childen  to  part  with  knives,  are  con- 
tent to  let  them  play  with  rattles.''  "  Very  good,  (adds  Dr.  McCrie,) 
but  if  children  are  suffered  to  play  too  long  with  rattles,  they  are  in 
great  danger  of  not  parting  with  them  all  their  days." 

2  Brit.  Crit.  for  October,  1842,  p.  333. 
26* 


306  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

enslaved  to  the  crown.  The  clergy  are  obliged  to 
acknowledge  the  sovereign  as  clothed  with  supreme 
ecclesiastical  authority.  The  Queen  is  the  Head  of 
the  Chnrch.  And  by  the  thirty-sixth  canon,  agreed 
upon  in  1603,  no  person  can  become  a  minister  in 
that  Church,  without  subscribing  this  article,  to  wit: 
that  "the  king's  majesty  under  God  is  the  only 
supreme  governor  of  this  realm,  and  of  all  other  his 
Highnesses'  dominions  and  countries,  as  well  in  all 
spiritual  or  ecclesiastical  things,  or  causes,  as  tem- 
poral." The  clergy  cannot  meet  in  convocation  with- 
out the  Queen's  leave.  Having  met,  they  can  enact 
nothing  without  her  consent.  And  what  is  enacted 
they  cannot  publish  without  her  authority.  ^  "  If  any 
alteration  takes  place,  it  is  not  by  the  power  of  the 
clergy,  but  of  the  parliament  and  the  king.  If  a  single 
occasional  and  temporary  collect  be  wanted,  on  a  fast 
or  thanksgiving  day,  for  the  use  of  the  parish  priests, 
the  college  of  Archbishops  and  Bishops  have  not  a 
right  to  make  it  without  an  order  from  the  king.  The 
impotence  of  both  houses  of  convocation,  when  form- 
erly allowed  to  meet  and  to  act,  was  such  that  they 
could  not  even  censure,  with  effect,  the  erroneous 
opinions  of  a  member  of  their  own  body.  A  woman, 
who  then  sat  on  the  throne,  was  of  a  different  opinion 
from  all  the  clergy  of  the  land,  and  her  opinion  pre- 
vailed. They  thought  Whiston  [the  Arian]  a  heretic : 
good  queen  Anne,  of  blessed  memory,  was  of  a  differ- 
ent judgment ;  and  Whiston  remained  unrebuked. — 
Tlie  alteration  of  anything  which  may  bo  considered 
as  a  standing  rule,  requires  still  more  of  the^  civil 
authority :  there  must  be  the  concurrence  of  the  lords 

»  For  the  authoritie?,  see  "Plea  of  Presbytery,"  Second  Edit.  (Bel- 
fast) p.  175. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  307 

and  commons,  as  well  as  the  approbation  of  the  king 
or  queen.  Various  changes  have  been  made  of  late 
in  the  frame  of  the  Church  respecting  the  residence 
of  the  clergy,  the  power  of  the  Bishops,  and  the 
appointment  of  curates.  But  by  whom  have  they 
been  made  ?  By  the  clergy  in  convocation  ?  No  such 
thing:  but  by  his  majesty  and  the  lords  and  com- 
mons in  parliament  assembled.  By  them  all  is  done. 
They  are  the  sole  reformers  :  and  without  their  per- 
mission and  authority,  the  clergy  cannot  wear  a  gar- 
ment of  a  different  shape  or  colour  in  their  ministra- 
tions. So  entirely  is  the  civil  authority  the  head  of 
the  Church,  that  her  thousands  of  clergy,  dignified  and 
subordinate,  cannot  alter  a  single  question  in  the  cate- 
chism, nor  wear  a  blue  surplice  instead  of  a  white 
one,  were  they  so  inclined.  Here,  then  is  a  parlia- 
meiitary  Church,  as  to  its  origin,  a  Church  wholly 
77iade  by  laymen,  and  alterable  by  laymen  according 
to  their  sovereign's  pleasure.  It  has  been  attempted 
to  represent  the  Church  as  the  ally  of  the  state ;  but 
the  state  is  the  head :  the  Church  one  of  the  inferior 
members.  The  Church  of  England  is  the  creature  of 
the  state,  as  much  as  the  army,  the  navy,  the  courts 
of  justice,  or  the  boards  of  custom  and  excise. '^^ 

The  case  is  even  worse  than  this.  Not  only  does 
the  civil  magistrate  "  enact  the  creed"  of  the  Church, 
"  frame  its  prayers,"  and  "  prescribe  the  number  and 
form  of  the  sacraments"  to  be  administered;  but  "the 
parish  priest  has  no  authority  to  exclude  the  most 
profligate  sinner  from  communion;  the  lordliest  Pre- 
late or  Primate  cannot  [without  subjecting  himself  to 
an   action   for  damages]   excommunicate   the    most 

'  Bogue  and  Bennett's  Hist,  of  Dissenters,  I.  103,  4. 


308  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

abandoned  sinner,  or  suspend  the  most  immoral  ec- 
clesiastic from  his  functions;  and  should  either  the 
Priest  or  the  Prelate  attempt  to  exercise  the  discipline 
prescribed  by  the  Lord  Jesus  in  his  house,  he  will 
speedily  be  made  to  understand,  by  the  terrors  of  a 
praemunire,  or  the  experience  of  a  prison,  that  he  is 
not  appointed  in  the  Church  of  England  to  administer 
the  laws  of  Christ,  but  the  statutes  of  the  imperial 
parhament,  or  the  injunctions  of  the  crown."  ^ 

Most  persons  will  be  apt  to  think,  after  reading 
these  testimonies,  that  the  Church  of  England  is  the 
last  one  of  the  Protestant  Churches  that  should  be 
heard  boasting  of  its  polity.  Erastianizsd,  enslaved, 
''in  chains,'^  (as  the  Puseyites  themselves  say,)  what 
right  has  she  to  glory  over  the  free  Churches  of  the 
Reformation  ?  A  proper  sense  of  her  vassalage  would 
at  least  keep  her  silent.  Silence  becomes  her — and 
humiliation.  She  is  really  entitled  to  the  compassion 
of  her  sister-churches ;  and  would  have  it,  if  her  de- 
portment was  at  all  suited  to  her  circumstances. 
Even  with  all  the  unseemly  airs  her  leaders  are 
forcing  her  to  assume,  they  can  but  pity  while  they 
rebuke  her — as  one  would  pity  a  galley-slave  who 
should  go  about  in  his  fetters  and  manacles  prating 
of  his  freedom  and  trying  to  make  other  people  put 
on  irons  like  his  own. 

"But  the  disabilities  of  that  Church,"  it  will  be 
said,  "  arise  from  her  connection  with  the  state,  and 
ought  not  to  be  urged  as  an  objection  to  her  polity." 

»  Presbyterian  Review,  ut  svpra.  The  article  here  referred  to,  on 
the  "Anglican  Reformation,"  is  replete  with  valuable  historical  in- 
formation, and  will  well  repay  perusal.  The  Presbyterian  Board  of 
Publication  have  prefixed  it  to  their  recent  edition  of  Dr.  Brown's 
interesting  work  on  "Puseyite  Episcopacy." 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSIO]?^.  309 

I  answer — the  very  thing  we  except  to  is  that  her 
polity  WdiS  framed  by  the  state.  She  has  been  from 
her  origin  a  State-Church.  By  this  I  mean,  not 
simply  that  she  has  been  an  established  Church,  but 
that  she  was  in  the  first  instance  fashioned  by  the 
State,  and  has  been  ever  since  subject  to  such  modi- 
fications as  the  State  might  choose  to  make  in  her 
constitution,  faith,  or  worship.  I  have  proved  this 
already.  And  if  further  proof  were  wanting,  it  is 
to  be  found  in  a  fact  of  recent  occurrence  that- 
occasioned  no  small  excitement  in  the  hierarchy; 
— I  refer  to  the  consolidation  of  several  of  the  Irish 
dioceses  by  act  of  Parliament.  The  Tractarians 
say  of  this  matter:  "  The  Legislature  has  lately  taken 
upon  itself  to  remodel  the  dioceses  of  Ireland ;  a 
proceeding  which  involves  the  appointment  of  certain 
Bishops  over  certain  clergy,  and  of  certain  clergy 
under  certain  Bishops,  without  the  Church  being  con- 
sulted in  the  matter.''  (Tract  No.  2.)  A  prominent 
and  zealous  minister ^  of  the  Establishment,  declares 
this  act  to  be  "the  annihilation  of  her  Episcopal  offices 
by  a  set  of  laymen;"  and  says,  "  If  we  submit  to  this 
bill,  let  us  call  ourselves  a  religious  club,  instituted  by 
the  House  oi  Covumons,  durante  bene  placito;  but  as 
to  an  Apostolical  Church,  with  Apostolical  office  and 
authority,  let  us  preserve  enough  of  Christian  honesty 
and  truth  no  longer  to  usurp  the  tide." 2  The  State, 
however,  in  adopting  measures  of  this  kind,  is  only 
carrying  out  the  policy  with  which  Henry  VI H.  and 
EUzabeth  commenced.  They  constructed  a  frame- 
work for  the  Church  to  suit  themselves,  and  then 
forced'\\.  upon  her.  In  this  frame-work  were  included 
Prelacy,  and  the  rites  and  ceremonies  commented  on 

1  The  Rev.  R.  McGhee.  2  piea  for  Presbytery,  p.  176. 


310  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

SO  freely  by  the  Reformers  in  the  letters  that  have  been 
quoted.  I  have  not  cited  those  letters  to  show  that 
the  habits  and  ceremonies  they  condemn  are  wrong  in 
themselves.  I  enter  not  at  all  into  that  question.  My 
sole  object  has  been  to  show  what  the  English  Re- 
formers thought  about  the  system  of  government  and 
worship  entailed  upon  their  Church  by  the  crown.  I 
felt  it  due  to  my  argument  to  state  the  fact  that  in 
arranging  that  system,  the  State  and  the  Church  were 
arrayed  against  each  other — that  the  civil  power  ap- 
proved of  it,  and  the  spiritual  power  disapproved  of 
it — that  the  Reformers  would  have  carried  the  reform 
much  further,  but  the  crown  would  not  let  them — and 
that  they  finally  acquiesced,  in  the  hope  that  the  times 
might  become  more  auspicious  for  assimilating  the 
order  and  worship  of  their  Church  more  nearly  to  the 
standard  of  the  other  Protestant  churches.  I  bring 
forward  this  fact  as  aggravating  in  no  small  degree 
the  INTOLERANCE  of  the  High-Church  party.  The 
scheme  in  behalf  of  which  this  intolerance  is  dis- 
played, is  one  for  which  they  are  indebted  to  two  des- 
potic and  semi-papistical  English  sovereigns.  1  do  not 
say  that  if  those  sovereigns  had  been  thorough  Prot- 
estants, and  allowed  the  Reformers  to  have  their  own 
way.  Prelacy  might  not  afterwards  have  sprung  up 
amidst  some  of  the  convulsions  of  the  British  empire, 
and  been  transmitted  to  this  country.  We  are  not 
concerned  now  with  what  might  have  been,  but  with 
what  has  been.  The  scheme  was  fabricated  by  the 
state,  not  drawn  from  the  Bible  by  the  Church.  And 
that  this  scheme  should  have  become,  with  any  set  of 
men,  the  test  of  a  true  Church — that  they  should  even 
go  to  the  length  of  unchurching  all  Christian  denomi- 
nations that  have  by  the  ^ood  providence  and  grace 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  311 

of  God  been  preserved  from  adopting  it — of  consign- 
ing to  "  uncovenanted  mercy'^  all  who  in  flying  out 
of  Sodom  were  so  fortunate  as  to  reach  the  mountain, 
and  were  not,  like  themselves,  arrested  by  an  iron 
hand  when  only  mid-way  of  the  plain, — this,  surely, 
is  an  instance  of  assurance  of  which  the  world  has 
seldom  seen  a  parallel. 

A  second  consideration  which  aggravates  the  in- 
tolerance of  this  party,  is,  that  the  sect  for  which  they 
challenge  a  monopoly  of  Christian  ordinances  and 
privileges,  is  one  of  the  smallest  of  the  Protestant 
communions.  Truth  of  doctrine  may,  it  is  granted, 
be  the  heritage  of  the  few,  while  the  multitude  are 
given  np  to  error.  But  whenever  true  religion  has 
been  restricted  to  a  small  body  of  believers,  as,  for 
example,  in  the  Apostolic  age,  it  has  carried  with  it 
incontestable  evidence  that  such  was  the  case.  If 
Prelatic  Churches  could  give  equally  decisiv^e  evidence 
that  they  alone  possess  a  genuine  Christianity,  it 
would  be  the  duty  of  every  one  to  seek  a  union  with 
them.  But  when  a  Prelatic  Church  asserts  the  claim 
without  the  evidence  essential  to  substantiate  it — 
without,  in  other  words,  exhibiting  a  purer  or  more 
efl'ective  practical  Christianity  than  other  Churches — 
it  is  natural  to  inquire,  whether  its  pretensions  derive 
any  countenance  from  its  superior  extent  and  num- 
bers, as  compared  with  other  denominations.  Now 
it  is  a  well-known  historical  fact  that  all  the  Reformed 
Churches  discarded  the  yz/re  divino  doctrine  of  Pre- 
lacy, at  the  period  of  the  Reformation.  The  Church 
of  England  forms  no  exception  j  for  I  have  shown 
that  although  she  retained  Prelacy,  she  did  it  on  very 
different  grounds  from  that  of  its  being  of  divine 
right.     The  Swedish  and  Danish  Churches  also  re- 


312  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

tained  the  Episcopal  form  of  government ;  but  only 
as  a  matter  of  expediency.  ^  All  the  other  Reformed 
Churches,  notwithstanding  the  predilection  the  learned 
and  able  men  who  directed  their  affairs  might  natu- 
rally have  for  the  polity  to  which  they  had  been  ac- 
customed, repudiated  Prelacy.  Diocesan  Episcopacy, 
then,  probably  does  not  embrace  among  its  supporters 
a  twentieth  part  of  the  population  of  Protestant 
Christendom. 2  And  yet  this  mere  fraction  of  the 
Protestant  world  arrogates  to  itself,  or  rather  a  por- 
tion of  the  body  arrogates  for  it,  the  exclusive  posses- 
sion of  Gospel-rites  and  promises,  and  presumes  to 
declare  the  other  nineteen-twentieths  of  the  Protes- 
tants of  the  globe,  *'  out  of  the  pale  of  God's  cove- 
nant." This  view  is  still  more  striking  when  confined 
to  our  own  country.  According  to  the  latest  returns, 
the  whole  number  of  ministers  connected  with  the 
various  evangelical  Churches  in  the  United  States,  is 
seventeen  thousand  and  seventy-thr^se,  and  of  com- 
municants, two  millions  five  hundred  and  forty-four 
thousand  seven  hundred  and  sixty-three.  Of  this 
number,  there  are  connected  with  the  Protestant 
Episcopal  Church,  one  thousand  two  hundred  and 
twenty-two  ministers  and  seventy-five  thousand  com- 
municants;— in  other  words,  of  the  evangelical  minis- 
ters in  the  Union,  one  out  of  every  fourteen,  and  of 
the  communicants,  one  out  of  every  thirty-four,  is 
an  Episcopalian.  Now  the  High-Church  doctrine 
assumes,  according  to  these  data,  that  thirteen  out  of 
every  fourteen  evangelical  ministers  in  this  country, 
are  men  who  have  intruded  into  the  sacred  office, 

1  See  Dr.  Miller's  Letters,  8vo.  edit.  386-8. 

2  I  have  seen  it  stated  that  in  England,  out  of  a  population  of  thir- 
teen millions,  about  four  millions  belong  to  tlie  Established  Church, 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  313 

whose  commissions  are  a  nullity,  whose  ordinances 
are  invahd,  and  who  are  themselves  in  danger  of 
sharing  in  the  doom  of  Korah,  Dathan  and  Abiram: 
while  of  the  professing  Christians  in  these  Churches, 
thirty-three  out  of  thirty-four  have  no  portion  in  the 
promises,  and  cannot  reasonably  suppose  themselves 
to  be  in  the  way  of  salvation !  And  all  this,  not  be- 
cause they  do  not  exhibit  as  much  of  the  power  of 
Christianity  in  their  lives  as  their  Episcopal  neigh- 
bours, but  because  they  refuse  to  conform  to  that 
Church  or  some  other,  say  the  Romish,  that  pretends 
to  have  an  unbroken  prelatical  succession  in  its  min- 
istry! Surely,  the  men  who  bring  forward  such  a 
scheme  as  this,  must  count  largely  upon  the  credulity 
of  their  fellow-citizens,  and  their  ignorance  of  the 
scriptural  marks  of  Christian  character,  if  they  expect 
it  to  be  received. 

It  is  another  aggravation  of  this  intolerance,  that  it 
is  directed  only  against  matters  of  form  and  or- 
ganization. If  the  High-Church  party  were  rigorous 
in  enforcing  doctrinal  uniformity  and  great  strictness 
of  life  and  manners  within  their  communion,  their  in- 
tolerance of  other  forms  of  government  would  at  least 
have  the  merit  of  consistency.  But  on  both  these 
points  they  are  more  latitudinarian  than  perhaps  any 
other  evangehcal  body  of  Christians  in  Great  Britain 
or  America.  The  theology  of  the  Church  of  England 
has,  it  is  well  known,  undergone  an  entire  change 
(allowing  of  course  for  individual  exceptions)  since 
her  Articles  were  framed.  Her  Reformers  and  early 
divines  were  decided  Calvinists,  and  the  broad,  health^ 
ful  stamp  of  Calvinism  is  upon  her  Articles.  But  the 
theology  of  her  ministers  has  been  varied  and  fluc- 
tuating ever  since  the  restoration  of  Charles  II.  when 

27 


314  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

looseness  of  doctrine  and  of  morals  came  into  the  Church 
together.  The  British  Critic  (for  Oct.  1842,)  distinctly 
admits  the  change  in  the  divinity  of  the  Church,  and 
maintains  that  the  change  ought  still  to  go  on — as  it 
bids  fair  to  do.  "  The  Laudian  school  was  as  clearly 
a  neiv  development  of  the  Church,  in  its  day,  as  his- 
tory can  show  it.  And  be  it  well  noted,  it  was  a  suc- 
cessful development  —  it  established  itself.  Laud 
and  his  party  were  'innovators'  in  their  day;  but 
how  are  they  regarded  now?  As  our  greatest  doc- 
tors, the  highest  standards  and  brightest  ornaments  of 
the  Church.  .  .  .  The  truth  is,  these  divines,  by  a  dint 
of  immense  effort,  by  a  great  and  strong  heave,  lifted 
the  Church  above  the  levels  of  Calvinism  to  a  higher 
ground,  and  that  ground  has  remained  our  terra  firma 
to  this  day.  .  .  The  present  orthodox  divinity  of  our 
Church  is  a  development  since  the  Reformation  and 
a  reaction  upon  it."  Again:  "Calvin  and  his  school 
were  the  master-spirits  of  the  Reformation;  they  gave 
the  impulse,  and  they  left  a  stamp  upon  the  move- 
ment which  cannot  be  mistaken :  let  history  for  once 
be  allowed  to  speak.  The  full  development  of  Cal- 
vinism was  stopped  indeed,  but  only  because  the  Re- 
formation itself  was  stopi^ed;  and  its  peculiar  doc- 
trines remained  the  theology  of  our  Church  till  Laud 
upset  themP  "And  can  it  be  denied,  that  as  the 
Church  threw  off  her  Calvinism,  she  also  began  to 
incline  to  a  union  ivith  Rome,  i.  e.  if  we  are  to  take, 
as  we  must  do,  the  Laudian  school  as  the  then  repre- 
sentatives? But  we  will  only  proceed  at  present  on 
the  fact  that  she  did  throw  it  off^that  there  has  been 
a  change  in  our  theology  since  the  Reformation.  For 
if  the  precedent  has  been  set,  why  may  it  not,  with 
prudence  and  moderation,  be  followed  P^ 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  315 

It  is  easy  to  see  to  what  this  theory  of  progressive 
develojjment  tends,  and  to  what,  if  it  is  sanctioned,  it 
must  soon  bring  the  faith  d^ndi  frame-work  of  the  Eng- 
lisli  Church.  I  have  cited  the  passage  only  to  show  the 
shifting  character  of  her  theology.  Toplady ,  one  of  her 
able  divines,  in  describing  her  corrupt  condition  in  his 
day,  just  before  the  American  Revolution,  winds  up  a 
pungent  paragraph  (quoted  in  a  previous  chapter) 
with  asking  this  question ;  "  Is  there  a  single  heresy, 
that  ever  annoyed  the  Christian  world,  which  has 
not  its  present  partizans  among  those  who  profess 
conformity  to  the  Church  of  England?"  Whether 
there  are  now,  as  he  distinctly  intimates  there  were 
then,  Arians  and  Socinians  among  her  ministers,  is  a 
question  not  easy  to  decide.  That  there  are  Pela- 
gians and  an  abundance  of  Semi-Papists  will  not  be 
denied.  Yet  they  are  all  tolerated.  There  are  scores 
of  volumes  published  every  year  by  ministers  in  her 
communion,  which  are  so  replete  with  Popish  heresies 
that  any  one  of  them  would  insure  the  deposition  or 
suspension  of  its  author  in  any  other  Church  in  Great 
Britain  or  this  country,  pretending  to  be  orthodox. 
But  in  her  bosom  they  are  safe  from  molestation.  She 
reserves  her  anathemas  for  those  who  cannot  see  that 
the  Divine  Author  of  Christianity  has  suspended  sal- 
vation upon  submission  to  a  Prelate — for  those  who 
have  the  temerity  to  believe  that  a  man  may  obtain 
absolution  from  Christ  before  obtaining  it  from  a 
priest.  Differences  of  faith  she  will  compromise  on 
liberal  terms,  but  as  to  order,  the  only  alternative  is, 
"  Prelacy  or  uncovenanted  mercy. '^^ 

No  less  liberal  are  the  High-Church  party  as  re- 
gards the  regulation  of  the  conduct.  They  do  in- 
deed recommend   monkish   austerities   and  applaud 


316  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

tlie  Popish  contrivances  for  mortifying  the  flesh ;  but 
they  are  careful  to  have  it  understood  that  the  Church 
is  a  gentle  mother  who  will  humour  the  caprices  of 
her  children  even  if  they  should  lie  in  another  direc- 
tion. They  are  familiar  with  the  text.  ''  Be  not  con- 
formed to  this  world;"  but  they  remember  also  that 
the  wise  man  has  said,  "There  is  nothing  better  for 
a  man  than  that  he  should  eat  and  drink,  and  that  he 
should  make  his  soul  enjoy  good  in  his  labour ;"  and 
they  cannot  think  that,  according  to  the  analogy  of 
faith,  it  was  designed  by  the  former  injunction  to  cut 
people  off  from  worldly  amusements  if  they  felt  a 
disposition  to  participate  in  them.  A  man  may  in 
their  view  be  a  good  churchman,  and  do  many  things 
which  in  some  churches  would  subject  him  to  dis- 
cipline. But  he  must  not  attend  upon  the  ministra- 
tions of  a  preacher  who  cannot  trace  his  ecclesiastical 
pedigree  through  a  line  of  Prelates  to  the  Apostles. 
This  will  incontestably  prove  him  to  be  out  of  the 
pale  of  the  covenant.  Conformity  to  the  world  will 
be  tolerated,  almost  to  the  practical  obliteration  of  all 
distinction  between  professing  Christians  and  non- 
professors — error  in  doctrine  will  be  tolerated,  even 
to  the  verge  of  downright  Popery, — but  wo  be  to  the 
man  who  rejects  the  figment  of  an  unbroken  chain 
of  Diocesan  Bishops  for  eighteen  centuries. 

I  have  not  yet  done  with  the  intolerance  and  big- 
otry of  this  system.  It  was  a  saying  of  Robert  Hall's, 
"  He  that  is  good  enough  for  Ch^^ist,  is  good  enough 
for  me."  The  High-Church  theory  in  many  instances 
reverses  this  maxim.  It  rejects,  as  destitute  of  any  cove- 
nanted hope  of  salvation,  many  whom  Christ  has  mani- 
festly received;  it  receives  many  whom  He  has  as  yet 
manifestly  rejected.     Such  men  as  Watts  and  Henry, 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  317 

Owen  and  Baxter,  the  Erskines  and  Chalmers,  Claude 
and  Saurin,  Davies  and  Witherspoon,  and  a  host  of  oth- 
ers, living  and  dead — men  of  whom  the  world  was  not 
worthy — -are  branded  as  "aliens  from  the  common- 
wealth of  Israel,'*  and  usurpers  of  the  sacred  office; 
while  the  Popes  Vigilius,  Alexander  VL,  Caesar  Bor- 
gia, John  IX.,  John  XIII.,  and  many  others,  monsters 
in  wickedness,  are  not  simply  owned  as  members  of 
the  Church  Catholic,  but  reverenced  as  "  representa- 
tives of  Christ  and  successors  of  the  Apostles."  The 
troops  of  fox-hunting,  horse-racing  ministers,  that 
abound  in  the  Church  of  England,  with  the  formalists 
who  receive  the  ordinances  at  their  hands,  are  all  par- 
takers of  the  blessings  of  God's  covenant :  while  the 
thousands  of  faithful  and  godly  pastors  in  the  Metho- 
dist, Baptist,  Independent,  and  Presbyterian  Churches 
in  Europe  and  America,  with  the  multitudes  of  hum- 
ble and  exemplary  Christians  who  attend  upon  their 
ministrations,  are  guilty  of  schism,  and  in  imminent 
danger  of  perdition.  Plain  readers  of  the  Bible  have 
been  accustomed  to  think  that  it  made  a  man's  faith 
and  practice  of  primary  importance  in  deciding  upon 
his  Christian  character,  that  is,  upon  his  interest 
in  the  covenant  of  grace.  The  High-Churchman 
has  a  different  standard  of  piety.  He  does  not,  it 
is  true,  pretend  to  deny  the  validity  of  these  tests, 
but  he  has  another  which  takes  precedence  of  them. 
The  fundamental  question  with  him,  is,  not  whether 
a  man  cordially  receives  the  doctrines  of  the  Gospel, 
and  evinces  the  reality  and  power  of  his  faith  by  a 
corresponding  practice ;  but  whether  he  is  connected 
with  a  Prelatical  church.  If  he  is  not  in  a  Prelatical 
church,  no  matter  what  his  apparent  regard  for  evan- 
gelical doctrine,  his  humility,  benevolence,  and  activity 
27* 


318  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

ill  doing  good,  he  is  to  be  left  to  "  uncovenanted 
mercy;''  while  if  he  is  in  such  a  Church,  he  is  to  be 
recognized  as  having  a  covenant-interest  in  the  prom- 
ises, though  he  believes  in  transubstantiation,  purga- 
tory, the  invocation  of  saints,  prayers  for  the  dead, 
and  all  the  errors  and  superstitions  with  which  the 
"man  of  sin"  has  overloaded  the  simple  faith  of  the 
Gospel.  The  fair  inference  from  this,  is,  that  High- 
churchmen  consider  the  indications  of  piety  which  are 
so  common  among  Non-Episcopalians,  as  deceptive. 
They  afhrm  that  the  influences  of  the  Spirit  are 
promised  only  to  the  ministrations  of  persons  prelati- 
cally  ordained.  They  must,  then,  either  admit  that 
these  influences  are  bestowed  where  they  are  not 
promised,  and  that  in  as  ample  measure  as  where 
they  are  promised ;  or  maintain  that  the  faith  and 
love,  the  Christian  zeal  and  holy  living,  which  are 
found  in  non-prelatical  denominations,  are  not  real. 
One  or  the  other  of  these  alternatives  is  forced  upon 
them.  If  they  take  the  former,  it  will  involve  this 
consequence,  viz.  that  the  world,  to  which  the  Spirit 
is  not  promised,  has  just  the  same  reason  to  expect 
its  influences,  as  the  Church  to  which  it  is  promised. 
If  they  take  the  latter,  it  will  follow,  in  the  first  place, 
that  our  Saviour's  rule,  that  the  views  and  principles 
of  men  are  to  be  judged  by  their  "fruits,"  is  of  no 
avail;  2dly,  that  we  have  a  right  to  pronounce  men 
to  .be  at  enmity  with  God  and  exposed  to  his  wrath 
and  curse,  when  they  profess  a  hearty  belief  in  his 
word  and  appear  to  live  with  an  habitual  regard  to 
his  authority  and  glory;  and,  3dly,  that  all  Non-Epis- 
copalians  are,  and,  remaining  such,  must  continue  to 
be,  in  a  state  of  condemnation  and  misery. 

Leaving  them  to  choose  between  these  alternatives, 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  319 

the  first  of  which  is  subversive  of  their  system,  while 
the  last  exhibits  in  a  strong  light  their  arrogance  and 
bigotry,  it  is  proper  to  add  that  the  intolerance  of 
the  system  is  seen  no  less  in  its  treatment  of  churches 
and  nations,  than  of  individuals.  ^  It  affords  a  beauti- 
ful illustration  of  the  practical  appUcation  of  their 
principles  and  of  the  enlightened  charity  that  per- 
vades them,  that  Italy,  Spain,  Portugal,  Mexico,  Bra- 
zil, and  the  South  American  Republics,  are,  in  their 
view,  blessed  with  an  Apostolic  ministry,  and  enjoy, 
throughout  all' their  borders,  the  genuine  ordinances 
of  the  Church  of  Christ,  while  from  two-thirds  to 
three-fourths  of  the  inhabitants  of  Great  Britain,  and 
the  whole  population  of  the  United  States  except 
the  few  thousands  of  Episcopalians  and  Romanists 
amongst  us,  are  without  the  means  of  grace,  and  have 
their  abode  in  that  murky  region  which  "  lies  between 
the  Church  and  heathenism.'' ^^  The  ignorant  and 
degraded  Armenians,  Greeks,  and  Syrians,  of  the 
Turkish  Empire,  to  whom  the  pure  Gospel  had  not 
been  preached  for  centuries,  until  they  were  visited 
by  the  American  (Non-Episcopal)  missionaries  a  few 
years  since,  and  who  require  to  be  instructed  almost  in 
the  very  alphabet  of  Christianity,  these  people  have  a 
regular  ministry,  and  a  place  in  the  Church  Catholic, 
while  the  "Free  Church  of  Scotland"  Avhich  has  lately 
borne  so  illustrious  a  testimony  to  the  truth  and  power 
of  Christianity  and  sacrificed  all  its  earthly  emoluments 
and  honours,  to  maintain  the  "  crown  rights  of  the 
Redeemer,"  is  a  "  schismatical  organization,"  in  a 
posture  of  rebellion  against  the  Bishops,  the  lawful 
governors  of  the  Church,  and,  therefore,  against  Christ 
himself.     In  other  words,  High-Church  charity  is  a 

1  See  Chapter  V.  2  Tract,  No.  47. 


320  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

charity  that  concerns  itself  primarily,  not  about  ques- 
tions of  faith  and  holiness,  but  about  "  endless  gene- 
alogies" and  pedigrees.  It  can  look  with  stoical 
apathy  upon  a  conflict  like  that  which  has  recently 
shaken  Scotland  to  its  centre ;  but  it  is  put  into  ecsta- 
cies  when  a  corrupt  Church  draws  forth  from  its 
archives  a  musty  and  spurious  catalogue  of  Bishops 
reaching  back  to  the  Apostles.  In  can  spurn  the 
intelligent  and  virtuous  yeomanry  of  New  England, 
while  it  embraces,  as  genuine  children  of  the  Church, 
the  Lazzaroni  of  Italy.  Where  the  Apostolical  Suc- 
cession is  concerned,  it  sticks  at  no  common  obstacles. 
It  treats  even  bulls  of  excommunication  like  straws — 
be  they  ever  so  "  Apostolical."  It  does  not  scruple — 
so  comprehensive  and  fervent  a  charity  is  it — to  ac- 
knowledge both  the  Latin  and  Greek  Churches  as 
Churches,  though  each  of  them  has  excommunicated 
the  other,  and  one  of  them  has  excommunicated  the 
Church  of  England,  and,  of  course,  the  Episcopal 
Church  in  this  country.  In  all  cases  where  it  can 
catch  a  glimpse  of  the  genuine  "succession,"  it  dilates 
and  glows  with  an  ardour  worthy  of  that  charity  that 
*' belie veth  all  things,"  and  puts  up  with  rebuffs  which, 
it  would  seem,  must  extinguish  it  if  it  were  not  in 
truth  the  charity  that  '^beareth  all  things."  It  is  only 
when  it  turns  towards  a  schismatical,  Non-Prelatical 
body  that  it  begins  to  shrink  and  shrivel,  Hke  the 
leaves  of  the  sensitive  plant  when  they  are  touched, 
or  like  the  brilliant  apples  of  Sodom,  which,  on  being 
compressed,  are  transmuted  into  a  handful  of  ashes. 
This  is  the  only  test  it  cannot  bear.  And  the  effect 
that  follows  the  application  of  it,  shows  that,  in  prin- 
ciple, there  is  little  to  choose  between  High-Church 
"charity"  and  that  "charity"  whose  exploits  com- 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  321 

pose  SO  large  a  part  of  the  annals  of  Papal  Rome. 
Its  ready  tolerance  of  error,  its  undisguised  affinity 
for  some  of  the  worst  features  of  Popery,  and  its  fierce 
denunciations  of  the  Protestant  Churches,  give  pres- 
age of  what  might  be  expected  from  the  system  if 
it  once  obtained  the  power  to  enforce  its  arrogant 
pretensions. 


CHAPTER  XII. 


THE    SCHISMATICAL    TENDENCY    OF    THE    SYSTEM. 

High-Churchmen  have  been  wont  to  talk  with  a 
great  deal  of  complacency,  about  the  unity  and  peace 
of  their  own  Church,  as  compared  with  the  various 
"sects"  around  them.  To  cite  authorities  on  this 
point  would  be  superfluous:  for  the  sort  of  cant  here 
alluded  to  pervades  the  whole  tone  of  their  ministra- 
tions and  writings,  and  gives  a  colouring  even  to  their 
social  habits.  It  would  be  very  easy  to  show,  and 
indeed  has  been,  in  part,  shown  in  this  volume,  that 
notwithstanding  their  horror  of  "  sectarianism,"  the 
very  essence  of  sectarianism  impregnates  their  prin- 
ciples ;  and  that  while  they  glory  in  being  "  the 
Church,"  their  scheme  tends  to  the  subversion  of  the 
true  Church  of  Christ.  Without  undertaking  to  dis- 
cuss these  topics  in  form,  they  will  be  incidentally 
illustrated  in  the  remarks  I  design  to  make  on  the 
alleged  conservative  and  harmonizing  tendency 
of  the  Prelatical  system. 

It  is  an  unpalatable  truth  to  Prelatists,  but  their 


322  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

unseemly  boastings  have  made  it  necessary  to  state 
itj  that  Prelacy  has  been  eminently  the  paj^ent  of 
schisms  and  divisions.  Jerome  informs  us  that  the 
scheme  was  set  up  originally  as  a  remedy  for  schism. 
It  turned  out,  however,  in  this  case,  as  it  usually 
has  where  man  has  undertaken  to  improve  a  divine 
institution,  that  the  remedy  was  worse  than  the 
disease.  The  history  of  the  visible  Church  from  the 
fourth  century  to  the  sixteenth,  is,  as  I  have  had 
occasion  to  observe  before,  very  much  a  history  of  the 
quarrels  and  crimes  of  the  Bishops.  Since  that  period 
several  secessions  have  taken  place  from  the  Church 
of  England.  Whether  all  of  these  have  been  justifia- 
ble or  not,  it  is  not  material  to  inquire.  The  principal 
of  them  were  made  necessary  by  the  tyranny  of  her 
rulers.  "  She  has,  indeed,  created  separation  to  a 
greater  extent,  and  in  more  varied  forms,  than  any 

other  Protestant  Church  in  Christendom By  her 

despotic  constitution  and  her  unwarrantable  ceremo- 
nies, she  has  driven  from  her  pale  thousands  and  tens 
of  thousands  of  the  most  pious  and  enlightened  of 
British  Protestants.  When  the  Act  of  Uniformity  was 
passed,  it  was  not  without  weighty  reasons  that  in  a 
single  day  two  thousand  of  the  most  learned  and 
godly  ministers  that  ever  adorned  a  Christian  Church, 
resigned  their  livings  and  retired  from  her  commu- 
nion." ^  This  memorable  event  took  place  on  St.  Bar- 
tholomew's day,  August  24th,  1662.  The  sole  ground 
on  which  this  large  body  of  faithful  and  pious  men 
were  ejected  from  their  livings,  was,  their  refusal  to 
assent  to  every  thing  contained  in  the  Book  of  Com- 
mon Prayer.  In  many  parts  of  the  kingdom  they 
could  not  procure  the  Book  in  time  to  examine  it ; 

1  Plea  for  Presbytery,  2d  ed.  p.  65. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  323 

"so  that  in  their  fai'ewell  sermons  they  told  their 
flocks  that  they  were  obUged  to  leave  them,  for  not 
declaring  their  assent  to  a  book  which  they  had  not 
been  able  to  see.  But  this  was  no  obstacle  to  the 
ruling  party,  who  wished  for  the  most  costly  sacrifices 
at  the  shrine  of  absolute  obedience,  and  longed  to  rid 
themselves  of  men  who  were  troubled  with  a  con- 
science." ^  I  forbear  to  dwell  on  an  event  the  record 
of  which  constitutes  one  of  the  darkest  of  the  many 
dark  pages  in  the  history  of  the  English  government 
and  its  hierarchy.  Nor  is  it  necessary  to  repeat  here 
the  arguments  by  which  the  Dissenters  of  that  country 
have  vindicated  themselves  from  the  charge  of  schism, 
and  shown  that  the  Establishment  is  responsible  for 
alienating  from  her  at  different  periods  so  many  of  the 
best  of  her  children.  I  will  give  only  a  sample  of 
their  language  on  this  subject.  "We  are  accused  of 
schism — schism  denotes  a  separation  in  heart  and 
affections,  from  those  who  are  walking  according  to 
the  institutions  of  Christ.  But  wherein  are  we  guilty 
of  this  offence?  If  we  denied  Christ  to  be  the  only. 
Head  of  the  Church,  and  separated  from  such  as 
owned  him  Head,  it  would  be  schism;  but  we  assert 
his  sole  authority  in  his  Church.  If  we  assumed  the 
right  to  alter,  to  add  to,  or  to  take  away  from,  what 
he  established,  it  would  be  schism;  but  we  plead  for 
the  integrity  of  Christ's  constitution  and  associate  with 
those  who  do.  Show  us  that  we  separate  from  a 
Church  of  which  Christ  is  the  Head,  whose  doctrines 
are  the  pure  and  simple  doctrines  of  the  Gospel; 
whose  worship  is  that  which  Christ  prescribes;  which 
maintains  a  godly  discipline  by  restraining  transgres- 
sors from  her  communion,  and  admitting  only  such  as 

•  Bogue  and  Bennett,  I.  78. 


324  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

appear  to  be  his  true  disciples;  which  displays  kind 
forbearance  and  gentle  condescension  to  weak  and 
tender  consciences,  and  from  these  marks  demonstrates 
itself  to  be  the  Church  of  Christ.  Show  us  that  Ave 
separate  from  such  a  Church,  and  we  will  confess  our 
iniquity  and  own  ourselves  guilty  of  schism.  But,  if  we 
separate  from  a  mere  P arliamentary  Church,  which 
was  formed  into  shape  out  of  the  chaos  of  Popery, 
by  acts  of  the  English  legislature,  and  had  no  exist- 
ence before  the  year  1560 — a  Church,  which  in  none  of 
its  features  bears  a  resemblance  to  any  thing  earlier 
than  the  ecclesiastical  constitution  of  the  fourth  or  fifth 
century,  and,  in  some,  to  what  did  not  appear  till  the 
ninth  or  tenth — a  Church  which  has  so  many  things  to 
be  complained  of  in  its  constitution,  its  head,  its 
doctrines,  its  worship,  its  services,  its  sacraments, 
its  discipline, — to  call  this  schism,  and  charge  us  as 
schismatics,  because  we  are  not  of  her  communion, 
and  cannot  conscientiously  declare  our  unfeigned  as- 
sent and  consent  to  all  her  multifarious  code : — to  call 
this  schism!  Surely  it  is  full  time  that  the  word  were 
dropped,  and  that  the  accusation  ceased.  Those  who 
would  impose  such  inventions  on  the  disciples  of 
Christ,  instead  of  his  institutions,  are  the  schismatics, 
not  those  who  separate  from  them  for  conscience' 
sake.'^^ 

The  same  spirit  which  has  driven  so  many  enlight- 
ened and  conscientious  Christians  into  the  Dissenting 
Churches  in  England,  is  displaying  itself  now  in  the 
warfare  the  High-Church  party  is  waging  against 
other  denominations.  That  party  are  not  satisfied 
with  the  peaceful  exercise  of  their  own  rights  and 
privileges.      One  might  suppose  that  if  they  really 

»  Ibid.  pp.  149—51. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  325 

believed  their  heritage  to  be  the  paradise  they  repre- 
sent it,  they  would  be  content  to  enjoy  it:  or,  if  they 
must  needs  make  aggressive  movements  in  any  direc- 
tion, that  they  would  bend  their  efforts  to  the  subver- 
sion of  the  idolatry  and  superstition  which  still  hold 
so  large  a  portion  of  the  race  in  bondage. 

"  The  world  is  all  before  them  where  to  choose" — 
a  world,  two-thirds  or  three-fourths  of  which  is  en- 
slaved to  false  and  oppressive  systems  of  religion.  If 
they  are  smitten  with  so  fervent  a  zeal  for  the  honour 
of  Christ  and  the  glory  of  his  Church,  here  surely  is 
a  field  wide  enough  to  give  their  benevolent  sympa- 
thies full  play.  It  is  a  field,  too,  which  needs  their 
sympathy.  It  is  filled  with  the  miserable  and  the 
lost,  the  dead  and  the  dying — with  millions  who  must 
perish  unless  they  speedily  obtain  that  bread  of  life, 
which  these  Prelatists  tell  us  has  been  entrusted  to 
them  alone  for  distribution.  Yet  instead  of  respond- 
ing to  this  appeal  and  sending  forth  an  army  of  mis- 
sionaries to  redeem  these  interminable  moral  wastes, 
they  ore  laying  out  their  main  strength  in  a  united 
and  furious  attack  upon  the  Protestant  Churches. 
The  annihilation  of  these  Churches  seems  to  be,  at 
present,  the  leading  object  of  their  ambition.  They 
cannot  brook  the  idea  that  there  should  be  a  Church 
on  earth  which  is  not  governed  by  Prelates;  or  that 
any  man  who  has  received  no  better  ordination  than 
Timothy  had,  viz.  "  by  the  laying  on  of  the  hands  of 
the  Presbytery,"  should  be  recognized  as  a  Christian 
minister.  Judging  from  their  conduct,  they  regard 
the  existence  of  such  Churches  and  ministers  as  the 
chief  hinderance  to  the  spread  of  Christianity,  and 
deem  it  an  end  worthy  of  their  first  and  best  exertions, 
to  put  them  out  of  the  way. 

28 


326  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

Nor  is  this  the  whole  of  the  picture.  Not  only  are 
they  neglecting  the  work  of  missions,  to  carry  on  this 
contest  against  other  churches ;  but  their  principles, 
should  Providence  permit  them  to  be  enforced,  must 
seriously  embarrass,  if  not,  in  some  instances,  actually 
defeat,  the  eflbrts  of  those  churches  for  the  diffusion 
of  the  Gospel.  I  have  in  view,  in  this  remark,  the 
High-Church  theory  of  the  Church  and  its  dioceses, 
so  often  mentioned  in  this  work.  According  to  that 
theory,  the  Romish,  Greek,  Armenian,  and  Syrian 
Churches,  are  all  parts  of  the-  true  Church,  while  the 
Non-Episcopal  Protestant  Churches  are  no  Churches. 
Any  attempt  to  interfere  with  the  existing  arrange- 
ment of  the  former  Churches,  is  a  sin.  To  organize 
a  church  within  their  limits,  as  missionaries  are  ac- 
customed to  do  in  heathen  lands,  would  be  schismat- 
ical.  Nay,  Non-Prelatical  churches  are  not  to  be 
allowed,  if  there  be  any  way  of  preventing  it,  to  send 
missionaries  to  these  countries.  They  cannot  give 
them  Christianity.  The  Oriental  Christians  are  in 
the  true  Church  now,  and  all  that  Protestant  "  secta- 
ries" could  do  would  be  to  allure  them  out  of  the 
Church  into  the  world — to  wrest  from  them  the 
Christianity  they  have,  without  supplying  them  with 
any  thing  as  good  in  place  of  it.  It  is  on  this 
ground  that  the  leading  High-Church  organ ^  in  this 
country,  has  charged  the  missionaries  of  the  American 
Board,  with  spreading  "pestilential  and  seditious 
DOCTRINES  among  the  Christians  of  the  East,"  and 
with  making  common  cause  with  the  turks  against 
the  Eastern  Church."  If  these  are  the  honest  con- 
victions of  that  party,  they  cannot  but  do  every  thing 
in  their  power  to  thwart  the  missionary  operations  of 

•  See  the  "Churchman"  of  November  25th,  1843. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  327 

our  churches.  If  they  cannot  cripple,  our  resources 
at  home,  they  must,  if  possible,  prevent  our  mission- 
aries from  gaining  a  footing  within  the  domain  of  the 
Church  Catholic  abroad.  The  vast  empire  over  which 
the  Pope  sways  his  sceptre,  and  the  rival  empire  of 
the  Greek  Hierarchy,  with  their  several  dependencies, 
are  to  be  guarded  from  the  intrusion  of  such  men  as 
Mills  and  Brainerd,  and  Carey  and  Williams,  lest 
they  should  infect  them  with  "disorganizing  and  anti- 
Christian  errors."!  Even  the  Episcopal  churches  are 
not  to  attempt  the  renovation  of  those  withered 
branches,  except  in  subordination  to  their  respective 
rulers.  They  have  no  right  (such  is  the  theory)  to 
send  a  missionary  into  any  foreign  diocese  without 
permission  from  its  ecclesiastical  head.  Wherever 
any  church  has  established  a  diocese,  its  jurisdiction 
is  to  be  respected.  If  the  Romish  Church,  for  exam- 
ple, should  erect  dioceses  in  the  Island  of  Borneo,  and 
supply  them  with  Bishops  and  other  clergy,  this 
would  secure  to  her  the  spiritual  control  of  that  Island, 
and  the  Episcopal  Church  could  not  establish  a  mis- 
sion there  or  employ  any  means  to  evangelize  the 
natives,  without  her  permission. 2 

It  is  easy  to  see  how  injurious  this  whole  scheme 
must  be  to  the  propagation  of  pure  Christianity. 
"  What  immense  continents  must  thus  be  preserved  in 
their  idolatry  and  superstition  unbroken,  and  what 
stumbling-blocks  must  be  raised  up  to  the  reception 
of  the  truth,  in  those  quarters  where  the  advocates  of 
the  new  views  feel  themselves  at  liberty  to  attempt 
any  missionary  undertaking!  What  must  the  open- 
ing mind  of  a  heathen  inquirer  think  to  see  professed 
evangelical  Christians  cordially  welcoming  the   de- 

'Ibid.  2Seepp.  134,  5. 


328  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINljJ    OP 

graded,  idolatrous  Papist  as  a  Christian  brother,  and 
turning  away  with  disdain  from  Protestants  who  give 
evidence  of  the  faith  and  love,  the  disinterestedness 
and  zeal — in  short,  all  the  graces  of  the  Christian 
character — as  if  they  were  heathens,  and  all  because 
they  do  not  observe  the  same  external  rites  in  the 
same  form?  Though  there  had  been  nothing  else, 
this  necessary  want  of  harmony  of  feeling  and  effort 
for  the  evangelization  of  the  world,  would  be  an  omen 
most  adverse  to  the  claims  of  the  Anglican  School.  It 
would  show  that  they  preferred  outward  forms  and 
order  to  the  glory  of  God  in  the  conversion  of  souls; 
but  when  taken  in  connection  with  the  various  con- 
siderations which  have  been  suggested,  it  proclaims 
that  the  system  as  a  whole,  whatever  may  be  the  irre- 
proachable and  even  amiable  character  of  some  who 
hold  it,  and  whether  men  generally  are  aware  of  it  or 
not,  is  decidedly  anti-Christian,  fitted  to  retard  instead 
of  advancing  the  kingdom  of  the  Redeemer."  ^ 

Facts  like  these  illustrate  the  pretended  conserva- 
tive and  harmonizing  influence  of  High-Church 
principles.  If  history  is  to  be  trusted,  those  principles 
are  eminently  scHisMATicAL  in  their  tendency;  and 
the  system  to  which  they  belong  can  only  be  regarded 
"as  a  fire-brand  in  the  household  of  faith."^ — It  will 
be  claimed,  however,  or  would  have  been  until  re- 
cently, that  Prelacy  has  secured  to  the  Churches 
ivhich  have  adopted  it,  a  much  larger  measure  of 
peace  and  unity  than  are  enjoyed  in  other  com- 
munions. This  point  may,  like  the  other,  be  safely 
referred  to  the  arbitration  of  history,  or  left  to  each 
one's  observation.    But  it  is  proper  to  note  that  when 

'  Lorimer's  Manual  of  Presbytery,  p.  277.    Glasgow  edition. 
2  Oxford  Divinity. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  329 

Prelatists  boast  of  the  unity  of  their  Churches,  they 
do  not  mean  what  the  sacred  writers  mean  by  this 
term.  When  they  speak  of  unity,  it  is  of  "  the  unity 
oifaith,^^  of  th6  "unity  of  the  Spirit, ^^  of  Christians 
being  "  baptized  by  one  Spirit  into  one  body,"  and  of 
their  being  made  "  one  in  Christ  Jesus.''  On  unity  of 
this  kind,  the  Bible  sets  a  high  value.  But  the  unity 
of  Prelatical  Churches  is  of  a  different  sort.  I  do  not 
mean  that  there  is  no  oneness  of  faith  and  spirit 
among  their  members — for  no  one  can  doubt  that  they 
embrace,  within  their  various  communions,  a  large 
number  of  truly  pious  and  devoted  Christians  who  are 
one  in  Christ,  and  therefore  one  with  each  other, — but 
I  mean  that  this  is  not  required  even  in  those  who 
minister  at  their  altars.  The  unity  they  insist  upon  is 
an  external,  as  distinguished  from  a  spiritual  unity — 
a  unity  of  order,  as  distinguished  from  a  unity  of  doc- 
trine— a  unity  the  test  of  which  is  submission  to  Pre- 
latical authority,  as  distinguished  from  a  unity  the 
test  of  which  is  the  cordial  adoption  and  faithful  main- 
tenance of  a  specific  and  scriptural  system  of  faith. 
Whether  this  is  a  wise  arrangement  or  not,  is  a  ques- 
tion on  which  there  will  be  a  difference  of  opinion. 
Prelatists  usually  contend  that  it  is.  They  are  accus- 
tomed to  urge  it  as  a  proof  of  the  superiority  of  their 
organization  to  those  of  other  Churches,  that  they  allow 
this  latitude  of  theological  opinions  among  their  clergy. 
Of  the  fact  there  can  be  no  doubt.  Witness  the 
theology  of  the  Romish  and  Eastern  Churches.  That 
of  the  Church  of  England  is  probably  still  more  hete- 
rogeneous. «  The  religion  of  the  Church  of  England," 
says  Mr.  Macaulay,  in  an  article  already  quoted,  "  is, 
in  fact,  a  bundle  of  religious  systems  without  number. 

28* 


330  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

It  comprises  the  religious  system  of  Bishop  Tomline, 
and  the  religious  system  of  John  Newton,  and  all  the 
religious  systems  which  lie  between  them.  It  com- 
prises the  religious  system  of  Mr.  Newman,  and  the 
religious  system  of  the  Archbishop  of  Dublin,  and  all 
the  religious  systems  which  lie  between  them.  All 
these  different  opinions  are  held,  avowed,  preached, 
printed,  within  the  pale  of  the  Church,  by  men  of  un- 
questioned integrity  and  understanding."  ^  The  same 
diversity  of  faith  is  seen  among  the  Episcopal  Bishops 
and  clergy  in  this  country.  The  theological  pendu- 
lum vibrates  through  a  larger  arc  within  that  single 
Church,  than  it  does  within  all  the  other  evangelical 
churches  combined.  For  there  are  tied  together  there 
the  system  of  John  Calvin  and  the  system  of  Tract 
No.  90,^  and  "all  the  systems  that  lie  between  them." 
To  talk  of  the  unity  of  such  a  Church,  can  do  no 
harm  provided  it  be  understood  that  nothing  more  is 
meant  by  it  than  that  all  the  diversified  sects  and 
schools  which  enter  into  its  composition  have  united 
in  adopting  its  forms  of  government  and  worship, 
and  agreed  to  live  together.  But  it  seems  puerile  to 
parade  this  fact  as  a  proof  of  the  efficacy  of  Prelacy 
in  producing  unity.  It  is  no  great  achievement  for 
any  scheme  of  polity  to  produce  such  unity  as  this. 
Few  of  the  Reformed  Churches  have  thought  it  worth 
seeking:  most  of  them  have  shunned  it  as  fraught  with 
peril  to  their  peace  and  orthodoxy.  The  Church  of 
Rome  prizes  it,  and  has  attained  it  to  at  least  an  equal 
degree  with  any  Churches  under  Diocesan  Episcopacy. 
And  any  Church  may  have  \ifor  a  time,  which  will 
lay  more  stress  upon  forms  than  substance,  and  make 

»  Miscell.  III.  306.  2  See  the  Carey  ordination. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  331 

its  clergy  dependent,  for  promotion,  upon  their  eccle- 
siastical superiors.  Permanent  peace  and  substantial 
union,  however,  can  never  be  obtained  in  this  way  in 
a  Frotestant  Episcopal  Church.  Protestantism  will 
not  abide  such  a  conglomeration  of  views  on  funda- 
mental points  of  faith.  The  whole  history  of  the 
Church  of  England  proves  this.  That  Church  has 
not  been  without  her  periods  of  repose,  but  these 
have  uniformly  been  succeeded  by  great  convulsions. 
She  is  now  rocking  to  and  fro  like  a  city  in  an  earth- 
quake,— and  from  a  similar  cause.  The  hostile  ele- 
ments she  has  always  carried  in  her  breast,  have  been 
gathering  strength  for  the  last  quarter  of  a  century, 
and  now  that  the  match  has  been  appUed,  the  explo- 
sion is  terrific.  I  do  not  ask  it  tauntingly,  but  I  can- 
not forbear  asking  the  question,  could  any  thing  less 
have  been  expected  ?  When  conflicting  systems  of 
faith  have  been  brought  together  in  other  churches,  a 
similar  result  has  followed:  why  should  it  not  be  so 
in  the  Episcopal  Church  ?  A  church  with  a  tesselated 
theology  may  be  a  very  pretty  sight  to  a  politician 
or  an  amateur  philanthropist ;  but  churches  of  this 
kind  require  to  be  kept,  like  other  rarities,  in  a  cabi- 
net. They  are  to  be  looked  at,  not  handled — for 
show,  not  for  use.  Before  they  can  be  used  efl'ective- 
ly  for  any  length  of  time,  the  mosaic  work  must  be 
taken  out.  Judaism  was  unwilling  to  go  out  of  the 
Church,  when  Christianity  came  in :  "  the  son  of  the 
bond-woman"  insisted  upon  being  "  heir  with  the  son 
of  the  free  woman."  This  led  to  strife.  The  Apostle 
was  applied  to  for  a  remedy.  His  prescription  was  one 
which  some  of  his  "successors"  would  have  been  very 
slow  to  give : — "  Cast  out  the  bond-woman  and  her 
son."  So  it  has  been  with  the  Church  of  England.  Her 


332  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

Reformers,  as  I  have  shown,  tried  to  have  "  the  bond- 
woman cast  out,"  but  another  woman  on  the  throne 
befriended  her,  and  she  was  not  ejected.  Ample  room 
was  provided  for  sound  doctrine  and  evangehcal  piety; 
but,  unhappily.  Queen  Elizabeth's  passion  for  "the 
old  rehgion,"  secured  a  corner  for  that  too.  As 
a  natural  consequence,  whenever  there  has  been 
vitaUty  enough  in  the  body  to  call  its  slumbering 
energies  into  play,  there  has  been  a  conflict.  Some- 
times, for  a  long  period  together,  there  has  been  no 
conflict,  because  there  has  been  no  life.  The  dead  are 
always  quiet.  If  the  Church  of  England  enjoyed  a 
dignified  repose  during  a  considerable  part  of  the  last 
century,  it  is  sufiiciently  accounted  for  in  the  fact 
stated  by  Mr.  Romaine,  that  "  of  her  ten  thousand 
clergy,  there  were  not  seven  that  preached  the  Gos- 
peV^  Evangelical  religion  revived  at  length,  and 
"the  old  religion"  revived  too;  for  when  "the  sons 
of  God  come  to  present  themselves  before  the  Lord, 
Satan"  will  "come  with  them" — if  he  can.  Hence 
the  present  struggle.  It  is  a  struggle  between  true 
spiritual  religion  and  Popery — two  things  which  the 
Church  of  England  system  has  made  tenants  in  com- 
mon, under  a  belief  that  the  strong  arm  of  Prelacy 
would  be  able  to  keep  the  peace  between  them.  But 
Prelacy,  strong  as  it  is,  is  not  strong  enough  for  this. 
It  cannot,  with  impunity,  join  together  two  things 
which  God  has  put  so  far  asunder.  They  may, 
perhaps,  compromise  their  present  differences,  and  go 
on  again  together  for  a  time;  but  it  will  be  only  a 
truce.  There  can  be  no  permanent  peace — no  genu- 
ine, scriptural  unity — in  the  body,  until  one  or  the 
other  is  "  cast  out."  This  is  not  said  by  way  of  ad- 
vice.   No  Non-Episcopalian  would  presume  to  tender 


THE    APOSTl)LICAL    SUCCESSION.  333 

advice  in  a  case  like  this.  I  say  it,  as  a  Non-Episco- 
palian, in  self-defence.  High-churchmen  glory  over 
us  on  the  ground  of  their  pretended  unity  and  the 
efficiency  of  their  system  as  a  conservator  of  the 
peace.  My  answer  is,  not  merely  that  their  churches 
are  now  rent  (as  others  have  been  before)  with  dis- 
sensions; but  that  the  elements  of  strife  are  so  inter- 
woven in  their  system,  that  as  long  as  it  remains 
what  it  is,  lasting  unity  and  tranquillity  are  out  of 
the  question.  When  they  do  enjoy  peace,  it  is  not 
the  kind  of  peace  which  we  value  most ;  and  it  rests 
on  so  precarious  a  basis,  that  to  boast  of  it,  is  like  a 
man  with  the  ague  boasting  of  health,  in  the  intervals 
between  his  chills,  .^//churches  have  been  taught — 
the  Episcopal  with  the  rest — that  creeds  and  forms 
are  not  of  themselves  adequate  to  keep  out  error  and 
strife.  They  are  undoubtedly  useful,  when  framed 
agreeably  to  the  Scriptures,  in  promoting  this  end; 
but  the  main  reliance  of  Churches,  as  well  for  this  as 
every  other  blessing,  must  be  upon  the  power  and 
grace  of  Him  whom  the  venerable  Apostle  saw  "  walk- 
ing in  the  midst  of  the  seven  golden  candlesticks  and 
holding  the  seven  stars  in  his  right  hand." 


334  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 


CHAPTER  XIII. 


ASPECT  OF  THE  SYSTEM  TOWARDS  INQUIRING  SINNERS. 


CONCLUSION. 

I  HAVE  dwelt  long  upon  the  characteristics  and 

TENDENCIES  OF  THE  HIGH-CHURCH  SYSTEM,  but    theiB 

is  one  of  its  phases  not  yet  distinctly  presented,  which 
is  too  important  to  be  wholly  overlooked.  The  sys- 
tem claims  to  hold  out  to  men  the  only  way  in  which 
they  can  be  saved — to  be  the  only  system  which  can 
guide  them  into  the  path  that  leads  to  heaven.  It  is, 
therefore,  due  to  its  advocates  and  to  the  cause  of 
truth,  to  notice,  before  closing  this  work,  the  aspect 

WHICH  IT  WEARS  TOWARDS  AN  HONEST  INQUIRER 
AFTER    THE     WAY    OF    SALVATION.       The  jallcr's  qilCS- 

tion,  "What  must  I  do  to  be  saved ?'^  must  be,  with 
any  individual,  the  most  solemn  of  all  questions. 
Wrung  as  it  commonly  is  from  a  heart  oppressed 
with  a  sense  of  sin  and  trembling  under  the  appre- 
hension of  Divine  wrath,  it  requires  to  be  met  with  a 
kind,  prompt,  and  explicit  answer.  Such  was  the 
answer  the  jailer  received :  "  Believe  on  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ,  and  thou  shalt  be  saved,  and  thy  house." 
(Acts  xvi.  31.)  Very  different  is  the  answer  that 
must  be  given  to  this  question  by  a  consistent  High- 
Churchman — an  answer  eminently  fitted  to  increase 
the  inquirer's  perplexity  and  distress.  I  do  not  say 
that  a  consistent  High-Churchman  would  not  direct 
him  to   believe  in  Christ  as  the  only  Saviour;  but 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  335 

fidelity  to  his  principles  would  require  him  to  state 
further,  that  he  could  not  come  to  Christ  except 
through  the  Church,  and  that  in  order  to  exercise 
faith  in  Him  *he  must  be  baptized  by  a  minister  who 
could  trace  his  lineage  to  the  Apostles,  through  an 
unbroken  Prelatical  succession.  Failing  of  this,  (he 
would  be  bound  to  inform  him,)  there  would  be  no 
hope  of  salvation  for  him  except  in  God's  "uncove- 
nanted  mercies.'' ^  To  the  class  of  Prelatists  whom  I 
have  in  view,  this  answer  doubtless  appears  lucid  and 
satisfactory ;  because  their  minds  are  made  up  as  to 
where  the  Church  and  the  successors  of  the  Apostles 
are.  But  it  might  be  otherwise  with  the  inquirer.  It  is 
no  extravagant  supposition,  that  with  him  these  might 
still  »be  open  questions.  And  if  so,  the  tender  of  bap- 
tism, say  by  his  own  Rector,  would  not  meet  his  case. 
According  to  the  instructions  given  him,  the  turning 
point  of  his  salvation  lies  in  his  receiving  baptism 
from  a  minister  in  the  line  of  the  Apostolical  Succes- 
sion. The  mere  assertion  of  his  Rector  that  he  is  in 
this  line,  only  shows  that  he  himself  thinks  so.  The 
man  demands  proof  of  the  fact.  And  unless  he  is 
wilhng  in  a  matter  of  infinite  moment  to  himself,  to 
go  forward  without  knowing  whether  he  is  in  the 
broad  or  the  narrow  way,  he  must  sit  down — anxious, 
heavy-laden,  alarmed,  as  he  is — to  study  the  ques- 
tions, whether  the  Church  in  which  Providence  has 
placed  him,  is  a  true  Church,  and  whether  his  pastor 
has  really  received  the  gift  of  the  Holy  Ghost  by  re- 
gular transmission  from  the  Apostles.  Those  who 
have  read  the  previous  chapters  of  this  work,  will  be 
able  to  form  some  idea  of  the  difficulties  he  must  en- 
counter in  prosecuting  these  inquiries.     If,   on  the 

'  See  Chapters  I.  and  II. 


336  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

one  hand,  he  finds  a  large  number  of  ingenious  and 
learned  writers  advocating  the  claims  of  his  Church 
(supposing  him  to  be  an  Episcopalian)  to  the  genuine 
succession;  he  will,  on  the  other,  find  at  least  as 
many  more,  of  equal  learning  and  piety,  who  either 
deny  the  necessity  of  any  such  succession,  or  deny 
that  the  Episcopal  Church  has  any  claim  to  it.  Of 
these  last,  not  a  few  will  be  individuals  who  have 
carefully  investigated  the  whole  subject,  analyzed  the 
pretended  catalogues  of  Bishops,  and  sifted  the  entire 
evidence  on  which  the  theory  rests.  In  addition  to 
this,  his  embarrassment  will  be  increased  by  the  fact 
that  the  Church  of  Rome,  which  is  admitted  by  a 
large  portion  of  his  own  Church  to  be  a  true  Church, 
pronounces  the  Episcopal  Church  to  be  no  Church, 
and  ridicules  the  notion  that  she  has  the  Apostolical 
Succession.  It  would  be  of  no  avail  to  say  to  a  man 
in  these  circumstances,  ^'  Hear  the  Church."  You 
would  have  to  convince  him,  in  the  first  place,  of  his 
obligation  to  "hear  the  Church;"  and  when  this 
was  accomplished,  he  would  tell  you  that  the  very 
object  he  was  labouring  at,  was  to  find  the  Church. 
On  the  principle  that  the  Church  could  be  known 
only  by  the  possession  of  an  uninterrupted  chain  of 
Prelates,  the  further  he  pushed  his  researches  and  the 
more  he  read  and  reflected  on  the  subject,  the  more 
his  doubts  and  perplexhies  would  be  multiplied. 
Such  a  man  might,  through  the  merciful  interposition 
of  the  Spirit  of  God,  at  length  discover  the  true  foun- 
dation and  rest  upon  it;  but  the  probabilities  are 
quite  as  great  that  he  would  land  in  the  gloom  of 
infidelity. 

The  practical  working  of  the  system  in  this  par- 
ticular, will  be  even  more  strikingly  exhibited  if  the 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  337 

case  of  an  inquirer  be  supposed  in  some  country 
where  there  are  only  Romish  or  Greek,  and  Non-Pre- 
latical  Protestant  Churches  or  ministers.  Take,  for 
example,  the  Sandwich  Islands.  The  American 
Missionaries  have  been  instrumental,  through  God's 
blessing,  in  redeeming  those  islands,  to  a  great  extent, 
from  the  most  debasing  idolatry,  and  conferring  upon 
them  Christianity  and  civilization.  The  French  gov- 
ernment has,  at  the  cannon's  mouth,  forced  the  help- 
less natives  to  receive  Rorhan  Catholic  priests  among 
them,  who  are  zealously  propagating  their  supersti- 
tions. According  to  the  High-Church  theory,  a  Sand- 
wich Islander  who  should  be  led  to  serious  reflection 
about  his  spiritual  concerns,  would  be  more  likely  to 
learn  the  way  of  salvation  from  one  of  those  priests 
than  from  any  of  the  Protestant  Missionaries.  Nay, 
by  going  to  the  priests  and  receiving  baptism  he 
would  be  regenerated  and  brought  into  a  covenant 
relation  with  God;  while  by  listening  to  the  Protest- 
ant ministers,  he  would  be  giving  heed  to  men  who 
had  usurped  the  sacred  office  and  whose  counsels  he 
could  not  follow  without  jeoparding  his  salvation. — 
So  as  to  an  inquirer  in  Syria  or  Constantinople.  It 
would  be  the  duty  of  such  a  man  to  apply  for  direc- 
tion to  one  of  the  ignorant  and  deluded  priests  of  the 
Greek,  Syrian,  or  Armenian  Churches,  in  preference 
to  any  of  the  educated  and  excellent  Non-Episcopal 
ministers  who,  under  the  care  of  the  American  Board, 
have  been  for  many  years  trying  to  rekindle  the 
almost  expired  flame  of  Christianity  in  those  benighted 
regions.  Those  priests  could  j^w/ him  into  the  way 
of  salvation;  but  our  missionaries  could  not  guide  him 
to  the  Lamb  of  God ! 

29 


338  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OP 

This  is  no  fancifal  or  exaggerated  representation ; 
but  a  candid  exhibition  of  the  adaptation  of  the  High- 
Church  system  to  the  case  of  inquiring  sinners.  It  is, 
indeed,  one  of  its  very  worst  features,  that  it  is  fitted 
to  perplex,  and  where  it  does  not  perplex,  to  delude 
all  who,  in  the  critical  circumstances  of  an  awakened 
soul,  are  not  prepared  to  follow  blindly  the  dictates 
of  men  who  assure  them  that  they  can  trace  their 
spiritual  paternity  to  the  Apostles,  and  that,  therefore, 
to  be  baptized  by  them*  will  secure  to  them  regene- 
rating grace.  The  contrast  between  this  scheme, 
in  its  treatment  of  this  interesting  class  of  persons, 
and  the  glorious  Gospel  of  Christ,  must  be  apparent 
to  every  one  who  is  even  superficially  acquaiuted 
with  the  New  Testament.  1  dismiss  the  topic,  there- 
fore, without  entering  into  any  minute  elucidation 
of  it. 

My  subject  is  not  exhausted,  but  I  feel  that  it  is  time 
to  bring  this  volume  to  a  close.  I  have  given  in 
Chapter  I.,  my  reasons  for  entering  upon  this  investi- 
gation, by  exhibiting,  from  their  own  writings,  the 
exclusive  and  arrogant  pretensions  of  the  High-Church 
party.  In  Chapter  II.  to  VI.  inclusive,  I  have  brought 
the  dogma  of  an  unbroken  prelatical  succession  to  the 
test  of  Scripture,  of  History,  and  of  admitted  facts — 
exposed  the  fallacy  of  its  principles,  and  contrasted  it 
with  the  true  doctrine  of  succession.  In  the  second 
part  of  the  work,  on  the  characteristics  and  tendencies 
of  the  system,  I  have  endeavoured  to  show  that  it 
proposes  an  unauthorized  and  delusive  rule  of  faith — 
that  it  puts  the  Church  in  Christ's  place — that  it  is  at 
variance  with  the  whole  scope  and  tenor  of  the  New 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  339 

Testament — that  it  tends  to  aggrandize  the  prelatical 
clergy  and  to  substitute  a  mere  ritual  rehgion  for  true 
Christianity — that  it  is  essentially  intolerant  and  schis- 
matical — and  that  in  its  practical  working  it  is  adapt- 
ed to  harrass  and  delude  those  who  are  honestly  in- 
quiring for  the  way  of  salvation. 

In  taking  my  leave  of  the  subject,  I  repeat  the 
remark  with  which  I  set  out,  that  on  the  part  of  Non- 
Episcopalians  this  controversy  is  a  work  of  self- 
defence.  We  have  been  forced  into  it.  We  claim 
to  have  a  chartered  right, 

"  Purchased  and  seal'd  with  blood  divine," 

to  a  participation  in  the  privileges  and  blessings  of 
the  Christian  Church.  If  we  claimed  the  whole 
Church,  we  should  give  just  ground  of  offence  to  pre- 
latical sects.  But  we  put  forward  no  such  preten- 
sions. Notwithstanding  the  manifold  defects  which 
we  see  in  its  organization,  we  recognize  the  Epis- 
copal denomination  as  entitled,  with  ourselves,  to  a 
share  in  the  blessings  of  God's  covenant.  High- 
Churchmen,  however,  are  not  satisfied  with  this. 
They  come  into  our  churches  and  say,  "  You  are  no 
churches,  and  you  never  can  be  until  you  assimilate 
your  polity  and  worship  to  ours,  and  your  ministers 
place  themselves  under  the  rule  of  our  Bishops." 
This  is  the  ground  of  the  controversy.  As  long  as 
this  demand  is  pressed,  there  must  be  controversy. 
Much  as  we  value  peace  and  desire  to  cultivate  it,  we 
cheerfully  forego  the  advantages  of  it,  if  they  are  to 
be  purchased  only  by  surrendering  our  churches  to 
the  domination  of  Prelacy.  Those  who  like  that  sys- 
tem, are  welcome  to  enjoy  it.     But  we  can  find  noth- 


340  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE    OF 

ing  in  its  history,  from  its  origin  in  the  third  or  fourth 
century  to  the  present  day,  to  inspire  iis  with  a  pas- 
sion for  it.  And  when  the  attempt  is  made  to  force 
it  upon  us,  we  shall  not  fail  to  use  all  suitable  means 
for  averting  so  serious  a  calamity,  and  preserving 
inviolate  the  freedom  wherewith  Christ  hath  made  us 
free. 

While,  however,  this  is  the  immediate  ground  of  the 
present  controversy,!  have  not  concealed  the  fact  in  this 
volume,  that  there  is  another  which  has  great  weight 
w4th  Non-Episcopalians.  The  Word  of  God,  as  un- 
derstood by  most  commentators,  predicts  that  a  great 
revival  of  Fopery  will  take  place  about  this  period 
of  the  world.  When  Bunyan  wrote  his  immortal  alle- 
gory, two  hundred  years  ago.  Giant  Pope  in  conse- 
quence of  "the  many  shrewd  brushes  he  had  met  with 
in  his  younger  days,  was  grown  so  crazy  and  stiff  in 
his  joints,  that  he  could  do  little  more  than  sit  in  his 
cave's  mouth,  grinning  at  Pilgrims  as  they  went  by, 
and  biting  his  nails  because  he  could  not  come  at 
them.''  The  Papacy  continued  in  this  infirm  state 
until  down  to  the  close  of  the  last  century:  and  people 
began  to  doubt  whether  the  torpid  mass  could  ever 
be  revivified.  This  skepticism  has  passed  away. 
That  Church  has,  within  the  last  twenty-five  years, 
been  waking  from  its  lethargy,  until  now  new  life  is 
infused  into  every  part  of  it.  The  "  man  of  sin" 
is  evidently  preparing  for  his  last  and  fiercest  onset 
upon  "the  saints  of  the  Most  High  God."  The 
secret  of  this  transformation  is  to  be  found  in  the 
revival  of  the  Order  of  the  Jesuits,  the  most  insidious 
and  effective  agency  which  even  the  Church  of  Rome 
has  ever  had  for  opposing  true  Christianity. 


THE    APOSTOLICAL    SUCCESSION.  341 

Simultaneously  with  this  extraordinary  and  omi- 
nous change  in  the  internal  condition  of  the  hierarchy, 
a  movement  still  more  portentous  occurs  without  its 
limits.  There  springs  up  in  the  bosom  of  a  Protestant 
Church,  a  party,  small  at  first,  but  soon  comprising  a 
very  large  number  of  its  most  learned,  able,  and 
influential  divines,  who  set  about  "unprotestant- 
izing"  their  own  Church,  and  reducing  it  to  its  for- 
mer bondage.  Not  satisfied  with  bringing  back  into 
-their  own  communion  the  heresies  and  mummeries 
which  their  fathers  cast  off  at  the  Reformation, 
they  re-assert  the  authority  over  other  Churches 
which  the  Pope  has  always  claimed,  and  employ  all 
their  resources  to  carry  their  arrogant  pretensions 
into  effect,  and  to  disseminate  their  pernicious  doc- 
trines. 

Protestants  cannot  look  upon  these  movements 
with  indifference.  I  say  these  "movements,"  but 
they  are  properly  parts  of  the  same  movement.  Of 
the  two,  we  have  more  to  dread  from  the  Oxford 
Popery  than  from  the  Roman  Popery — especially  in 
this  country.  It  is  more  refined,  more  gentle,  and 
recommended  hj  more  agreeable  associations,  both 
civil  and  social.  The  inexperienced  and  unwary  are, 
therefore,  more  liable  to  be  captivated  and  ensnared 
by  it:  and  souls  are  more  likely  to  be  ruined.  Both, 
however,  are  tending  to  one  ultimate  result,  the  sub- 
stitution of  an  external  for  a  spiritual  religion — the 
setting  up  of  a  kingdom  of  meats  and  drinks,  in  place 
of  that  kingdom  which  is  "righteousness  and  peace 
and  joy  in  the  Holy  Ghost.'^  In  these  circumstances, 
it  behoves  even  the  humblest  of  those  who  are  con- 
cerned for  the  "peace  of  Jerusalem,'^  and  the  honour 

29* 


342  THE    HIGH-CHURCH    DOCTRINE,   ETC. 

of  Christ,  to  aid  in  counteracting  the  efforts  of  Ro- 
manists and  their  "  Anglo-CathoUc"  alUes.  We  may 
not,  if  we  ivould,  suppress  our  testimony  against 
their  subtle  and  destructive  errors.  It  is  with  this 
feeUng,  and  under  this  strong  conviction  of  duty, 
that  this  volume  has  been  written.  It  is  my  un- 
worthy and  inadequate  response  to  what  I  believe 
to  have  been  a  call  of  Providence  as  imperative 
as  it  certainly  was  unexpected.  To  His  blessing 
I  now  commend  it — praying  that  He  may  make 
it  instrumental,  in  some  humble  measure,  in  arrest- 
ing the  progress  of  error  and  superstition,  and  pro- 
moting the  cause  of  "  pure  and  undefiled  religion." 


343 


APPENDIX. 


Note  to  page  201. 


The  treatise  from  which  this  passage  is  taken,  *'  On  the 
Necessity  of  Reforming  the  Church,"  has  hitherto  been  in- 
accessible to  the  mere  English  reader.  A  translation  of  it 
has  recently  appeared  in  London,  and  is  already  reprinted 
in  this  country.  The  public  will  now  have  an  opportunity 
of  seeing  for  themselves  with  how  much  ingenuousness  Cal- 
vin has  been  treated  by  various  Prelatical  writers,  in  refer- 
ence to  a  sentence  which  occurs  in  this  work.  This  sen- 
tence has  been  quoted  times  without  number,  for  the  purpose 
of  producing  the  impression  that  Calvin  thought  Episcopacy 
the  scriptural  form  of  government,  and  that  he  was  extreme- 
ly anxious  to  have  the  Continental  Churches  organized  upon 
that  plan.  Thus,  Bishop  Hobart  makes  the  following  repre- 
sentation, (Apology,  p.  91.)  "  Calvin,  in  his  book  concern- 
ing '  the  necessity  of  Reforming  the  Church,'  makes  a  decla- 
ration which  has  frequently  been  adduced :  '  If  they  would 
give  us  such  an  hierarchy,  in  which  the  Bishops  should  so 
excel,  as  that  they  did  not  refuse  to  be  subject  to  Christ,'  &c., 
'  then  I  will  confess  that  they  are  worthy  of  all  anathemas, 
if  any  such  shall  be  found  who  will  not  reverence  it,  and 
submit  themselves  to  it  with  the  utmost  obedience.'  What 
strong  language  is  this !  He  could  not  get  an  Episcopacy, 
but  what  was  subject  to  the  Pope  of  Rome.     '  But,'  says  he, 

*  if  they  would  give  us  an  hierarchy  subject  to  Christ  alone,' 
he  not  only  professed  a  willingness  to  receive  it,  but  de- 
nounces an  anathema  against  all  who  should  reject  it.  Nay, 
so  firm  appears  his  conviction  that  such  an  Episcopacy  was 
scriptural  and  primitive,  that  he  expresses  a  doubt  whether 

*  any  such  should  be  found.' " 

The  impression  this  passage  is  adapted  to  make,  is,  that 
Calvin,  in  penning  the  sentence  in  question,  was  writing 


344  APPENDIX. 

on  the  subject  of  organizing  the  Continental  Churches. 
Bishop  Hobart's  avowed  object  in  quoting  it,  is  to  show  that 
this  great  Reformer  "  approved  in  the  strongest  language  of 
a  primitive  Episcopacy,  such  as  the  Church  of  England 
possessed."  He  subsequently  appeals  to  it  again  and  again, 
to  show  that  Calvin  regarded  an  Episcopacy  like  that  of  the 
Church  of  England,  as  the  true  Scripture  model,  and  that 
his  heart  was  set  upon  having  the  other  Reformed  Churches 
assimilated  to  it.  He  makes  Calvin  say,  "  If  they  would 
give  us  such  an  hierarchy,"  &c. ;  whereas  he  simply  says, 
let  them  show  us  (exhibeant)  such  an  hierarchy.  And  in 
his  paraphrase  of  the  sentence  he  says,  "  He  (Calvin)  could 
not  get  an  Episcopacy,"  &c. 

This  whole  representation  is  stamped  with  gross  unfair- 
ness. Calvin's  remark  has  no  reference  whatever  to  the 
organization  of  the  Reformed  Churches.  He  is  repelling  the 
charge  brought  against  them  by  the  Papists,  that  they,  the 
Reformers,  had  made  a  schism  in  the  Church.  This  he  does, 
by  showing  that  the  unity  of  the  Church  consists  not  in 
any  mere  outward  organization,  but  in  oneness  of  faith  and 
union  with  Christ.  Pastors,  he  says,  "are  invested  with  the 
government  of  the  Church  on  no  other  terms  than  that  of 
being  ministers  and  witnesses  of  the  truth  of  God."  He 
denounces  an  anathema  against  all  who  would  violate  the 
unity  of  the  Church,  "  as  Paul  describes  it."  The  Papal 
See,  however,  had  usurped  a  primacy  to  which  it  had  no 
just  claims,  and  pronounced  all  those  schismatics  who  re- 
fused submission  to  its  authority.  This,  he  show^s  from 
Cyprian,  is  setting  up  a  false  test  for  "  ascertaining  the  true 
communion  of  the  Church."  And  to  illustrate  his  own  idea 
of  schism,  he  thus  proceeds  : — "Heresies  and  schisms,  there- 
fore, arise  when  a  return  is  not  made  to  the  origin  of  truth, 
when  neither  the  head  is  regarded,  nor  the  doctrine  of  the 
heavenly  Master  preserved.  Let  them  show  us  a  hierarchy 
in  which  the  Bishops  are  distinguished,  but  not  for  refusing 
to  be  subject  to  Christ,  in  which  they  depend  upon  him  as 
the  only  Head,  and  act  solely  with  reference  to  Him,  in 
which  they  cultivate  brotherly  fellowship  with  each  other, 
bound  together  by  no  tie  but  his  truth;  then,  indeed,  I  will 
confess  that  there  is  no  anathema  too  strong  for  those  who 
do  not  regard  them  with  reverence,  and  yield  them  the 
fullest  obedience.  But  is  there  any  thing  like  this  in  that 
false  mask  of  hierarchy  on  which  they  plume  themselves  ? 


APPENDIX.  345 

The  Roman  Pontiff  alone  as  Christ's  Vicar,  is  in  the  ascen- 
dant, and  domineers  without  law." 

Every  candid  reader  must  perceive  that  there  is  no  allu- 
sion here — not  the  slightest — to  the  polity  of  the  continental 
Churches — no  intimation  of  a  wish  to  have  them  Episcopally 
organized — no  hint  of  a  preference  for  Prelacy  over  Presby- 
tery. The  passage  relates  entirely  to  the  charge  of  schism 
urged  against  them  for  quitting  the  Romish  Church.  The 
whole  amount  of  it,  is,  "If  the  Church  of  Rome  were  a  pure 
Church,  united  in  the  profession  and  maintenance  of  Christ's 
truth,  and  provided  with  faithful  and  godly  Bishops  and 
Pastors,  in  that  case  separation  from  it  would  be  schismati- 
cal,  and  I  would  anathematize  him  who  should  be  guilty  of 
it."  In  other  words,  Calvin  was  not  so  hostile  to  Prelacy 
(which  he  and  all  the  Reformers  regarded  as  a  hitman 
institution)  but  that  he  considered  it  as  the  duty  of  those 
whose  lot  Providence  had  cast  in  a  Prelatic  church,  to  remain 
there  as  long  as  it  had  the  truth,  enjoyed  the  labours  of 
pious  Bishops,  and  maintained  a  pure  worship  and  scriptural 
discipline.  This  is  the  fair  import  of  that  famous  testimony 
for  EpiscoPxVCy,  which  is  to  be  found  paraded  under  Cal- 
vin's name  in  all  the  modern  High-Church  polemical  works, 
from  octavos  down  to  three-penny  pamphlets. 

One  other  circumstance  must  be  mentioned,  which  gives 
an  air  of  absolute  ludicrousness  to  the  grave  attempt  of 
Episcopal  writers  to  make  out  that  Calvin,  in  the  passage 
above  quoted,  was  sighing  for  an  Episcopacy  like  that  of 
the  English  Church,  as  the  best  blessing  that  could  be 
desired  for  the  continental  churches.  The  Letter  in  which 
this  passage  occurs,  was  written  in  1544.  This  was  only 
nine  years  after  the  Papal  supremacy  was  abolished  in 
England.  The  Reformation  there  was,  indeed,  hardly  be- 
gun. Popery  was  still  the  religion  of  the  court  and  the 
people.  It  was  still  (says  Bishop  Short,  in  speaking  of  the 
state  of  things  at  the  close  of  Henry  VIII. 's  reign,  1547)  a 
capital  offence  to  deny  the  corporal  presence  of  Christ  in 
the  Lord's  Supper;  the  cup  was  still  denied  to  the  laity;  an 
unnecessary  and  compulsory  restraint  was  imposed  on  the 
marriage  of  the  clergy ;  ....  the  use  of  private  masses  was 
continued ;  the  necessity  of  auricular  confession  was  still 
sanctioned ;  and  the  Latin  language  still  used  in  the  mass." 
To  crown  all,  the  licentious  and  despotic  Henry  had  put 
himself  into  the  Pope's  place.    He  was  the  acknowledged 


346  APPENDIX. 

"  Head  of  the  Church."  The  Bishops  took  out  their  com- 
missions in  his  name,  and  held  them  during  his  pleasure. 
So  that  the  Church  had  only  exchanged  one  tyrant  for 
another.  And  this  was  the  model  church  to  which  Calvin 
longed  to  assimilate  the  churches  of  the  continent !  This 
was  the  "  EpiscorACY"  which  no  Church  could  voluntarily 
decline  without  incurrino;  his  "anathema!" 


Note  to  Chapter  XII. 

Episcopal  writers  are  in  the  habit  of  lauding  Prelacy  as 
the  only  guardian  of  the  truth.  They  are  fond  of  prepar- 
ing and  exhibiting  catalogues  of  the  "  sects,"  large  and 
small,  of  all  countries,  and  their  several  modes  of  belief,  for 
the  purpose  of  showing  that  the  communion  of  the  "  Church 
Catholic"  affords  the  only  preservative  against  heresy. 
These  documents,  in  so  far  as  the  leading  Protestant  denomi- 
nations are  concerned,  are  usually  mere  caricatures.  And 
if  it  were  otherwise — if  Protestantism  were  really  the  mother 
of  heresy,  that  they  pretend  it  is — with  what  decency  could 
they  repeat  the  charge?  Where  Protestantism  has  led  one 
individual  into  error.  Prelacy  has  led  five.  Look,  for  ex- 
ample, at  the  Church  of  Rome.  In  the  creed  of  Pius  IV.,  the 
authorized  summary  of  the  Papal  faith,  are  enumerated, 
tradition,  the  seven  sacraments,  the  Tridentine  doctrine 
of  justification,  transubstantiation,  and  the  sacrifice  of  the 
mass,  purgatory,  invocation  of  saints,  indulgences,  venera- 
tion of  images,  and,  finally,  "  all  other  things  delivered, 
defined,  and  declared  by  the  sacred  canons,  and  general 
councils,  and  particularly  by  the  holy  council  of  Trent." 
"  Out  of  this  faith,"  it  is  added,  "  none  can  be  saved." 
Such  is  the  creed  of  a  Prelatic  Church — a  true  branch  of 
the  Church  Catholic,  according  to  High-Churchmen — which 
embraces,  as  estimated  by  Malte-Brun,  116,000,000  of 
members. 

Take,  again,  the  other  great  division  of  the  Church  Catho- 
lic— the  Greek  Church.  This  Church  retains  the  seven 
sacraments,  claims,  like  Rome,  the  power  of  working  mira- 
cles, holds  to  the  intercession  of  saints,  clerical  celibacy, 
transubstantiation,  pilgrimages,  prayers  for  the  dead,  and,  in 
a  word,  to  nearly  all  the  Popish  superstitions.  A  late  writer 
cited  by  Mr.  Bickersteth  in  his  "  Divine  Warning,"  in  intro- 


APPENDIX.  347 

ducing  an  epitome  of  the  faith  and  religious  observances  of 
that  body,  says,  its  members  may,  with  few  exceptions, 
*'  be  classed  into  infidels  or  unbelievers,  formalists,  and 
bigots."  This  Church  numbers,  according  to  Malte-Brun, 
about  70,000,000  of  members. 

It  will  be  time  enough  for  High-Churchmen  to  talk  of 
"  the  development  of  modern  systems,"  and  to  upbraid  Prot- 
estantism with  a  tendency  to  generate  heresies,  when  they 
can  show  that  it  has  authoritatively  imposed  such  abomi- 
nable corruptions,  both  of  doctrine  and  worship,  as  tliose  of 
the  Latin  and  Greek  Churches,  upon  one  hunched  and  eigh- 
ty-six millions  of  people. 

The  comparison  might  be  brought  nearer  home.  Those 
who  boast  of  Prelacy  as  the  only  conservator  of  orthodoxy, 
would  do  well  to  consider  the  present  state  of  the  Church  of 
England.  It  is  amazing  with  what  assurance  they  can  talk 
about  the  alleged  errors  of  the  Protestant  denominations, 
when  Popery  (i.  e.  "  Popery  without  a  Pope,''''  as  the  pres- 
ent Pontiff  has  aptly  defined  Puseyism)  is  spreading  like 
wildfire  through  their  own  Church,  and  already  includes,  as 
is  confidently  asserted,  several  thousand  of  its  clergy  among 
its  supporters.  In  this  system,  tradition  is  associated  with 
the  Bible  as  the  rule  of  faith;  "  the  Church  usurps  the  place 
of  the  Saviour,  and  is  made  an  idol;"^  baptismal  regenera- 
tion and  justification  are  taught;  preaching  is  depreciated; 
the  doctrine  of  the  atonement  is  brought  forward  "  with  re- 
serve;" "voluntary  austerities  are  magnified;"  "forms  of 
prayer  are  idolized;"  and  "  much  is  made  of  external  things, 
such  as  bowings  and  dresses,  and  turnings  of  the  body,  and 
mere  outward  services."  "  We  are  told,  in  this  school,  that 
there  is  a  true  and  proper  sacrifice  for  remission  of  sins 
made  in  the  Lord's  Supper  by  the  minister,  in  a  strictly 
sacerdotal  character;  that  sin  after  baptism  has  no  promise 
of  pardon ;  that  departed  saints  are  to  be  invoked ;  prayers 
made  for  the  dead;  Catholic  councils  are  infallible;  the  cler- 
gy may,  by  authority  of  the  Church,  be  obliged  to  celibacy; 
the  primacy  of  St.  Peter  is  maintained,  and  the  strong  testi- 
mony of  revelation  against  the  Apostacy  is  softened  into  a 
description  of  it,  as  our  sister  and  mother.''''^  "  Here,"  to 
quote  the  language  of  the  excellent  Episcopal  author  of  the 
work  from  which  this  passage  is  taken,  "  is  distinctly  the 
defihng  and   polluting   breath  of  the  false   prophet.     The 

«  Bickerstcth.  2  gee  "  Divine  Warning,"  pp.  58-75. 


348  APPENDIX. 

doctrines  of  tlie  Gospel  are  removed,  and  the  souls  of 
men  are  starved  with  the  once  cast  away  husks  of  the 

man  of  sin Men  are  again   tricking  themselves 

out  in  the  tinselled  dresses  of  the  harlot  of  Babylon,  and 
renouncing  the  golden  faith  and  godly  love  of  our  holy, 
heavenly,  and  martyred  Reformers."  And  none  of  these 
men,  he  might  have  added,  are  disciplined  for  their  deadly 
errors.  Behold  here,  then,  the  potent  efficacy  of  Pre- 
lacy as  the  infallible  safeguard  against  heresy !  —  Most 
apposite  to  this  "  development,"  are  Dr.  Wainwright's  ob- 
servations on  what  is  styled  "  the  development  of  modern 
systems."  "  No  one,"  he  says,  "  who  believes  in  the  exist- 
ence of  a  visible  Church  of  Christ  on  earth,  can  doubt  that  it 
was  designed  to  be  the  teacher  and  protector  of  evangelical 
truth,  as  well  as  the  depository  of  holy  ordinances.  If,  then, 
it  can  be  made  clearly  manifest,  that  in  any  system  of  eccle- 
siastical discipline,  professing  to  be  the  Church,  holy  doc- 
trines which  have  '  every  where  and  at  all  times'  been  con- 
sidered as  fundamental  parts  of  gospel  truth,  have  gradually 
been  obscured,  cor?'vpted,  or  exploded,  or  that  opinions  un- 
knoum  to  the  Gospel — opinions  extravagant,  contradictory^ 
irreconcilable  icith  Scripture — have  been  bred  and  foster- 
ed, is  it  not  right,  is  it  not  the  part  of  true  charity,  to  solicit 
those  who  yet  adhere  to  this  system,  to  examine  once  more 
the  spiritual  house  they  inhabit,  to  ascertain  if  it  is  indeed 
*  built  upon  the  foundation  of  the  Apostles  and  Prophets, 
Jesus  Christ  himself  being  the  chief  corner-stone?' "  Let 
Prelatists  take  the  friendly  warning,  and  examine,  with  the 
Bible  in  their  hands,  the  foundations  of  the  Churches  in 
which  the  errors  above  specified  are  preached,  printed,  and 
circulated,  without  let  or  molestation  from  those  to  whom 
"  Christ  has  transferred  his  Headship." 


THE  END. 


Date  Due 

iH^k^i» 

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IN  U.  S.  A. 

